Ice Cream parlour HC grants four weeks to complete investigation

KOCHI: The High Court on Thursday granted four more weeks to complete the investigation into the case registered on the basis of disclosures made by K A Rauf, a relative of Industries Minister P K Kunhalikutty, that he had tried to influence witnesses in the ice cream parlour case.
Advocate General K P Dandapani submitted that 95 per cent of the investigation is over and requested six more weeks for completing the investigation.
The court recorded the submission and granted four weeks’ time and adjourned the case to January 30. A Division Bench comprising Acting Chief Justice Manjula Chellur and Justice P R Ramachandra Menon passed the order while considering a petition filed by Opposition Leader V S Achuthanandan seeking a CBI probe based on the new revelations in the case.
He alleged that the probe by the Special Investigation Team (SIT) was not effective. The case is that Kunhalikutty and Rauf had entered into a criminal conspiracy with several others for excluding the former from the ice cream parlour case registered at Nadakkavu police station in Kozhikode.

The duo had allegedly undermined the process of investigation as well as the trial by influencing the witnesses as well as the judiciary. Supreme Court senior advocate Rajindra Sachar, counsel for Achuthanandan, submitted that the court should restrain the investigating officer from filing the final report.
Once the report is filed before the trial court, the High Court will not have the power to monitor the probe. He further submitted that the petitioner was liable to know about the investigation.
To which the court said: “We do not want anyone to interfere at this stage.
This is nothing but putting pressure to do or not to do something.
After filing the final report also the petitioner can question the investigation.” The AG submitted that after the previous date of hearing, there was considerable progress in the investigation.
“As on December 22, as many as 129 witnesses were examined and 104 documents seized. On the basis of the investigation conducted so far, at least 15 more witnesses from various parts of the state have to be examined and some more documents have to be seized. The investigation could not be completed by the SIT. It requires some more time to complete the investigation,” the AG said.
The investigating officer Jaison K Abraham submitted the Action Taken Report (ATR) and the case diary in sealed covers.
The court examined the report and asked the AG to state when the last witness was examined. To which he said that it was on December 16. “The documents on record reveal that the investigation is progressing,” the court said.