Kerala Assembly Speaker seeks CM response to breach of privilege motion over mentor controversy

Kerala Assembly Speaker M B Rajesh has sought a response from Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan on a breach of privilege motion moved by Congress MLA Mathew Kuzhalnadan in connection with the mentor controversy involving the CMs daughter.

Official sources confirmed that on receipt of the motion, a notice was issued to the CM on July 6 seeking his response to it.

The Congress-led UDF opposition had last month said that it would take such a step in view of Vijayans allegedly “misleading” statement in the assembly about the reported connection between a global consultancy firm director and his daughters IT company.

Leader of Opposition V D Satheesan had said that Vijayan had stated on the floor of the House that there was no connection between his daughter and the particular person, one of the directors of the corporate firm which was involved in the appointment of key gold smuggling case accused Swapna Suresh in a state-run project.

“But, Mathew Kuzhalnadan, MLA, who raised the allegation, has proved that she (CMs daughter) had. So, we are going to move a privilege motion against the CM,” he had said.

During the discussions on an adjournment motion moved by the Opposition over the gold smuggling in diplomatic bag issue, Kuzhalnadan had claimed that a director of an international consultancy firm allegedly linked to an accused in the gold-smuggling case was the mentor of Vijayans daughter.

As the discussion concluded, the Chief Minister expressed his displeasure at the mention of his daughter and her company and attacked Kuzhalnadan, claiming that he was telling a “blatant lie.” Other LDF MLAs had also criticised Kuzhalnadan thereafter.

The next day, the Congress MLA contended that he stood by what he had said as it was based on information gleaned from a web archiving portal.

The Congress MLA from Muvattupuzha had displayed a screenshot of the website of the CMs daughters company to prove his point that the consultancy firms director was a mentor and guide to the companys founders which comprised only her.

(Except for the headline, this story has not been edited by The Federal staff and is auto-published from a syndicated feed.)