Vigilance court orders probe against Mani, George

Judge V Bhaskaran issued the order on petitions filed by Chairman of 'Malayalam Vedi' (an organisation), George Vattukulam and one P D Joseph.

Petitioners alleged that the two leaders of Kerala congress (M), a constituent of UDF, had a role in helping estate owners in Nelliyampathy pledge forest lands and availing huge loans from banks and suspected encroachments of government lands.

The Home department had earlier this month recommended a crime branch probe into the loan fraud committed by a group of estate owners in Nelliyampathy by pledging forest lands in banks. The recommendation was based on a letter given by Forest Minister K B Ganesh Kumar to Chief Minister and Home Minister requesting a probe by a special investigation team.

The Nelliyampathy issue is snowballing into a crisis in the UDF with some Congress MLAs prevailing on government for taking strong steps against encroachers and to launch steps to retrieve lands whose lease period had expired.

MLAs led by V D Sateeshan,T N Pratapan,V T Balaram, Hibi Eden had visited Nelliyampathy recently to press government on the issue.They had also met some central leaders.

Meanwhile, CPI-M's state unit said government had the responsibility to execute the court direction in a fair and judicious manner for which both Mani and George should resign from their posts.

The Vigilance department would not be able to conduct a fair probe into the complaint that the two leaders had "misused" their position to help estate owners, if they remained in their respective posts, a party statement said.

Stating that Nelliyampathy issue was very serious as the estate owners not only held on to their property even after the lease period had expired, but availed huge loans from financial institutions by pledging the property.

The statement said even Congress MLAs had demanded a fair probe into George's role in the estate case.