The Congress-led United Democratic Front (UDF) said the “cascading failures of the prosecution” that led to the acquittal of three “Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sangh (RSS) workers” accused of the murder of an Islamic cleric and Madrassa teacher, Mohammed Riyaz Maulavi, in Kasargode in 2019 had drawn the curtains back on the Left Democratic Front (LDF) government’s tacit understanding with the Sangh Parivar in Kerala.
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Leader of the Opposition V.D. Satheesan dared Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan to clarify whether the acquittal was a trade-off between the Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)] and Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in Kerala. He said the police and prosecution worked in tandem to save the “RSS activists”.
The acquittal appeared to have caught the LDF by surprise.
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CPI(M) State secretary M.V. Govindan told reporters in Kannur that the prosecution had a watertight case against the suspects. The verdict came as a bolt out of the blue, and the judgment was yet to be out. The government would appeal the finding and ensure the cleric’s family got justice.
Independent Legislator and CPI(M) fellow traveller K.T. Jaleel said the prosecution had furnished on record incontrovertible evidence linking the suspects to the crime. In a Facebook post, Mr. Jaleel said the verdict was shocking. “It was as if day had suddenly turned to night,” he wrote.
The shocked the prosecution, the government, and the cleric’s family. The Crime Branch had relied on scientific evidence and witness statements to press the case against the accused. None of the witnesses in the case had turned hostile. Moreover, the DNA evidence placed on record linked the accused to the murder indelibly. “It is understandable that bureaucracy sometimes imbues a communal colour. However, if the spectre of communalism seizes the judiciary, the social consequences will be terrible”, he said.