The Pinarayi Vijayan government appears to have been caught unawares in the unflattering and somewhat belated political backwash of its contentious decision on the eve of the 2021 Assembly elections to refer accusations of sexual misconduct raised against the late Chief Minister Oommen Chandy by the 2016 solar scam suspect, a woman, to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).
The CBI, which absolved Chandy of wrongdoing in early 2023, purportedly said in a recent court filing that a few Left Democratic Front (LDF) leaders had conspired to implicate the late leader falsely. It was unclear whether the CBI had spelt out the “clique’s” motive.
An online media broke the existence of the CBI’s supposed court document. The supposed legal record is yet to emerge in the public domain. Nevertheless, television news channels and Congress leaders echoed the CBI’s “conclusion” as a given.
