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October 06, 2023 12:27 pm | Updated 05:55 pm IST – Thiruvananthapuram
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Akhil Sajeev
The Kerala Police on October 6 arrested a former Communist Party of India (Marxist) [CPI(M)] activist on suspicion of orchestrating an appointment fraud using Health Minister Veena George’s office as a front.
The police identified the suspect as Akhil Sajeev, a former manager at the CITU’s district office in Pathanamthitta. The police said they detained him from Theni district in neighbouring Tamil Nadu.
The case has its provenance in a complaint filed by one Haridasan Kummoli, a resident of Malappuram. He alleged that he had paid ₹1.75 lakh as bribe to Akhil Mathew, Ms. George’s assistant, to get temporary employment for his daughter-in-law as a homeo medical officer in Ayush Mission.
Mr. Kummoli alleged that he had paid the final instalment of the “bribe” directly to Mr. Mathew outside the Minister’s office at the Secretariat. The accusation aired on television caught the government unawares.
Soon, Ms. George hurriedly held a press conference and said the government had ordered an investigation into the episode. She defended her assistant and asked him to file an impersonation and forgery complaint with the Cantonment police. A subsequent police investigation revealed that the racketeers had committed an elaborate hoax on their victim.
Investigators found that the suspects convinced Mr. Kummoli of their “influence in government” through recurrent WhatsApp messages and convincing mobile phone interactions. The police said the accused coaxed Mr. Kummoli to part with the sizeable sum in instalments, holding his daughter’s prospective employment as a carrot.
Soon after paying the bribe, Mr. Kummoli received a forged appointment intimation in his e-mail. But, the posting never materialised, forcing Mr. Kummoli to go public with his complaint.
The police suspect that some other person had impersonated the Minister’s private secretary and taken the final instalment of the bribe in person from Mr Kummoli.
They were verifying surveillance cameras in the vicinity to identify the recipient. The police were also probing the origin of the appointment memo e-mailed by the suspect and his collaborators to Mr. Kummoli.
The police said the fraud case registered against Mr. Sajeev in the Cantonment police station was the tip of the iceberg. He was wanted in similar appointment fraud and confidence trickery cases in Pathanamthitta and Kochi.
Investigators said Mr. Sajeev was merely the face of the racket, and more persons, including a lawyer, were involved in the fraud.
Earlier, the CITU had struck Mr. Sajeev’s name off its membership role on the charge of financial malfeasance.
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