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Congress MLA in Kerala accused
of forgery, arrested

Shobhana George, a Congress legislator, has been arrested by a special investigation team of the Crime Branch of the Kerala police in connection with the alleged fabrication of an intelligence report.

The report, which carries the name of the director general of the intelligence wing of the state police, linked Thomas to Rs 3.36 billion (Rs 336 crore) worth of hawala (illegal) transactions from Mumbai to Kerala between 1999 and 2000.

Shobhana, who belongs to the faction led by senior leader K Karunakaran, has been accused of forging the document in association with her personal assistant Anil P Sreerangan and a journalist Jayachandran as part of a plan to ease out Tourism Minister K V Thomas from the A K Antony cabinet.

Surya TV had on June 24 telecast a news report based on the forged document.

Shobhana, who represents Chengannur in Pattanamthitta district, was picked up from her house at Akulam in state capital Thiruvananthapuram at around 1330 hours IST and taken to the Crime Branch office.

When she was later being taken to a court, she fainted and had to be hospitalised. She is expected to be produced before a magistrate on Friday.

The CJM had on Monday issued a non-bailable arrest warrant against her following a report filed by the special investigation team listing her as an third accused in the case.

A case has been registered against her and three others, including Anil P Sreerangan, under section 466 of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) for forgery, section 471 of the IPC for presenting a fake document as genuine, section 120B of the IPC for criminal conspiracy and section 500 of the IPC for defamation.

Anil Sreerangan and Surya TV reporter Anil Nambiar, who has also been named in the case, had been arrested earlier. While the latter is out on bail, Anil Sreerangan is in police custody. Jayachandran, another accused in the case, is said to be absconding.

Shobhana has pleaded innocence alleging that the case was part of a move to mar her political career for having 'criticised the chief minister'.

Chief Minister A K Antony had termed the case as part of a plot to topple his 16-month-old government. Though he refused to elaborate, his supporters believe that the forged document was part of a larger plan to pave the way for the induction of Karunakaran's daughter Padmaja Venugopal into the state cabinet.

The senior leader had tried his best to ensure a ticket for his daughter to contest the assembly election in 2001. However, anti-Karunakaran factions in the party marred her prospects.

Padmaja was appointed as chairperson of the Kerala Tourism Development Corporation (KTDC) after the election.

The so-called report had surfaced after two members of the Karunakaran faction approached a vigilance court with a complaint against Thomas accusing him of amassing wealth beyond his known sources of income.

The Karunakaran faction had subsequently mounted a campaign for a cabinet reshuffle.

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