CM’s action raises eyebrows

THIRUVANATHAPURAM: On June 16,  2006, Home Minister Kodiyeri Balakrishnan was caught in a controversy  after he happened to share dais with a businessman in the city who was involved in a foreign currency smuggling case.

 About four-and-a-half years down the line, Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan had gone one step ahead by inaugurating the optical shop owned by the same businessman in the city.

J S Prakash, managing director of Rose Opticals,  is the controversial businessman who was an accused in two cases of foreign currency smuggling.  He was detained under the Conservation of Foreign Exchange and Prevention of Smuggling Activities Act (COFEPOSA) in 2004.

 The new showroom of Rose Opticals at Vellayambalam in the city was inaugurated by the Chief Minister on Monday and that too in the presence of Prakash. It is quite unusual for a Chief Minister to open an optical showroom.  

The newspaper advertisements given by Rose Opticals also kept mum on the person who was to inaugurate the showroom.

 The Chief Minister’s action has indeed raised many an eyebrow. “ Even if the case against Prakash is not existing now, it is never ever expected from a person like Achuthanandan who always speaks of ethics to inaugurate the shop of a person who had a tainted background, “ a senior bureaucrat in the state said.

 It may be recalled that a couple of years back Achuthanandan had stayed back from presenting a dothi to actor Jagathy Sreekumar at a function organised by the State Government to inaugurate the khadi-handloom dress code for government employees.

The tainted background of the actor,  who was allegedly involved in the infamous Vithura sex racket case,  was said to have provoked Achuthanandan to take such an extreme step at a public function.  But the same Achuthanandan,  who always pays more weightage to ethics,  had perfo rmed a volte face by inaugurating a shop owned by another tainted person.  It seems that Achuthanandan was kept in the dark about the background of Prakash.

 Kodiyeri was caught up in the controversy while he shared dais with Prakash at a function organised by the Thiruvananthapuram City Police to distribute 350 sunglasses sponsored by Rose Opticals for traffic police personnel. As the issue snowballed into a major controversy,  Kodiyeri had even sought an explanation from the then DGP Raman Srivastava.

An inquiry was also conducted by the then IG South zone Arun Kumar Sinha into the circumstances under which Prakash happened to share dais with the Home Minister.

The sunglasses distributed to the policemen were even returned to Rose Opticals in order to prevent further embarrassment, sources said.