Home Minister Ramesh Chennithala has termed the ‘blade mafia’ a social menace which has to be crushed.
Mr. Chennithala sought the support of social organisations in ‘Operation Kuberan,’ launched on Sunday, to rein in loan sharks who used muscle power to squeeze their debtors. The Minister was addressing a press meet here in the backdrop of a case regarding the death of five members of a family, who allegedly consumed poison, at Kizhakke Mukkolakal in Thiruvananthapuram on Saturday. The family was allegedly under threat from loan sharks, according to news reports.
Mr. Chennithala said private financiers continued to lend money at exorbitant interest rates despite the Money Lenders Act mandating that loan interest should not be higher than those prescribed by nationalised banks. He said that district police chiefs had been appointed as nodal officers under the Operation Kuber crackdown against the blade mafia. Mr. Chennithala said he had received reports that the sale of illicit liquor was on the rise owing to the continued shutdown of low-end bars in the State. Mr. Chennithala said the next UDF meeting would discuss the bar licence issue and leaders should refrain from making any public statement on the issue. He said neither the CBI nor the Union Ministry of Personnel had informed of any unwillingness on their part to investigate the murder of RMP leader T.P. Chandrasekharan in 2012.
