Kerala Lokayukta gives clean chit to Minister in reappointment of Kannur VC

Thiruvananthapuram, Feb 4 Kerala Lokayukta Justice (retd) Cyriac Joseph on Friday ruled that State Higher Education Minister R. Bindhu, who wrote two letters to Kerala Governor Arif Mohammed Khan demanding the reappointment of Kannur University vice-chancellor Gopinath Ravindran, does not tantamount to corruption and misuse of power.

It was veteran Congress legislator Ramesh Chennithala who had approached the Kerala Lokayukta demanding the removal of Bindhu after it surfaced that she wrote two letters to Khan.

The judgement said that by virtue of the Minister also holding the post of Pro-Chancellor she can always communicate with the Chancellor (Khan) and the Chancellor can use his discretion to take it or otherwise.

The Lokayukta did not go into the merit of the case of the reappointment as this is already in the Kerala High Court.

The reappointment of Ravindran had created a hornet's nest in the political fabric of the state with Khan himself coming out in the open and slamming the way the affairs in the higher education sector was being run.

Bindhu's predecessor K.T. Jaleel had to quit as State Minister in April last year after the Lokayukta ruled that the minister had misused his power and appointed his relative in a state run organisation.

Incidentally, the Lokayukta's verdict has come at a time when an Ordinance tweaking the powers of the quasi judicial body is lying before Khan, and the Congress, BJP and even the ruling front ally CPI has also condemned the manner in which Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan decided to tweak the powers.

Chennithala has said he will look into the future course of action on this after getting the full verdict.