HC quashes FIR against V S Achuthanandan in land allotment case

Reacting to the politically significant case, Chief Minister Oommen Chandy said his government would go ahead with legal proceedings in the case and denied having interfered in the case with political intentions.

Significantly, the order came when the government was moving ahead with plans to file a charge sheet in the case and seek the Governor's assent to prosecute Achuthanandan.

Welcoming the order, Achuthanandan also had a veiled dig at his CPI(M) detractors, saying the case was a conspiracy by Chandy and Muslim League leader and Industries Minister P K Kunhalikutty to remove him as Leader of the Opposition in the Assembly and install someone else in that position.

Talking to reporters here, the 88-year-old leader said details of the conspiracy would soon surface, adding, "you (media) can also perform your role in unearthing the entire conspiracy."

Rejecting Achuthanandan's charge, Chandy said the government had at no stage intervened in the case with political intentions and had always taken the stand that the law would take its own course.

On Achuthanandan's charge that there was a conspiracy to remove him as opposition leader, Chandy said "it is not the Congress that decides who should be leader of LDF opposition."

Meanwhile, CPI state secretary Panniyan Raveendram asked the government to resign in view of the order and said the decision vindicated the LDF stand that the case was politically motivated and a move to tarnish Achuthanandan's image as a crusader against corruption.

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