V.S. Arunkumar, son of former Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan, appeared before the Vigilance court in Kozhikode on Wednesday, responding to a notice earlier sent by the court to Mr. Achuthanandan, asking him to inform whether he had any objection related to the closure of five cases registered against SNDP leader Vellappally Natesan in a suspected microfinance fraud case.
Mr. Arunkumar appeared in the court as his father who initiated the legal battle against Mr. Natesan in 2015 alleging fraud, embezzlement, and graft in the name of microfinance scheme was unwell. Later speaking to the media, Mr. Arunkumar clarified that he was unaware of the details in the vigilance investigation report, and that a decision could be made on the same at a later stage.
The Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau(VACB) squad had given a clean chit to Mr. Natesan in five cases with the conclusion that the money given as micro finance loans had been paid back to the government, and that there had been no irregularities in the payment as alleged at the lower level.
Mr. Achuthanandan’s allegation was that Mr. Natesan had obtained an undue pecuniary advantage of ₹15 crore through the scheme and caused a corresponding loss to the government exchequer. He came out with the legal fight when Mr. Natesan’s State-wide ‘Samathwa Munnetta Yathra’ culminated in Thiruvananthapuram in 2015.
According to Mr. Achuthanandan who was then the Leader of the Opposition, the flagship microcredit scheme of the SNDP, which promised microcredit to its members through 1,000-odd self-help groups in the State, was converted into a money lending project at exorbitant interest rates. He had also alleged that the operator of the scheme forged many documents and invented fictitious beneficiaries to avail themselves of loans at a very nominal interest rate.
