The District and Sessions Court, Ernakulam, on Saturday (February 1), granted anticipatory bail to five CPI(M) leaders arraigned as key accused in a case registered by the Koothattukulam police over the alleged assault and abduction of the party’s Koothattukulam municipal councillor Kala Raju.
P.B. Ratheesh, Koothattukulam CPI(M) area secretary; Vijaya Sivan, Koothattukulam municipal chairperson; Sunny Kuriakose, vice-chairman; Suma Viswambaran, municipal councillor; and Febeesh George, CPI(M) local secretary, were arraigned as the first five accused in the case along with 45 others. Accused six to seven were arrested in the case and had since been granted bail.
In their bail plea, the petitioners had claimed that the case was filed on ‘experimental basis with malicious intentions’ and that the allegations were not sufficient to attract the Bharatiya Nyaya Sanhita section 140(3) (kidnapping or wrongful confinement), which was a non-bailable charge.
It was pointed out that Ms. Raju had not levelled any such allegation when she had visited the Koothattukulam Taluk Hospital on the evening of the alleged abduction on January 18 and that the prosecution materials did not prove that the accused had committed the said offence.
Published – February 01, 2025 07:53 pm IST