Thiruvananthapuram: The Enforcement Directorate has filed a 1000-page charge-sheet against M Sivasankar, the former principal secretary of the chief minister for his role in money laundering.
The charge-sheet comes only days before Sivasankar completes 60 days in custody, which would otherwise have entitled him to automatic bail.
ED had on Wednesday ordered confiscation of Sivasankar’s assets, including the Rs 1.8 crore retrieved from the bank locker jointly held by gold smuggling kingpin Swapna Suresh and the senior bureaucrat’s chartered accountant.
Meanwhile, the state jail department is continuing its hide and seek with the central agencies. Jail DGP Rishiraj Singh has issued a new circular under which Customs officials have been debarred from accompanying visitors to Swapna Suresh, who is held in the jail as a COFEPOSA accused.
Until the other day, Customs officials were allowed to accompany Swapna’s visitors as she is a COFEPOSA prisoner, although the practice with ordinary prisoners is not to allow such presence.
The central agencies believe that the new circular is part of the state administration’s effort to sabotage the investigations, of which they cite a number of instances.
