Thiruvananthapuram, Jan 30: With the opposition Congress-led UDF taking on Kerala Excise Minister M.B.Rajesh for giving a brewery license to a controversial company involved in the Delhi excise case, Leader of Opposition V.D. Satheesan on Thursday wanted the Minister to explain the role of BRS leader K.
Kavitha, daughter of former Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao. Addressing the media, Satheesan said he wished to ask why Kavitha came to Kerala and whom she met.
"I want to ask Rajesh to tell the reason for Kavitha's visit to Kerala and whom all she met. It should be noted that Kavitha was in jail in the controversial Delhi excise policy case," he said and asked the media to find out where she stayed when she was in Kerala.
The firm in question, Oasis Commercial Private Ltd, whose top official was previously jailed in the Delhi excise policy case, received approval to establish multiple facilities in the water-scarce district of Palakkad.
These include an ethanol plant, a multi-feed distillation unit, an Indian-Made Foreign Liquor bottling unit, a brewery, a malt spirit plant, and a brandy/winery plant at Kanjikode on a 26-acre plot purchased two years ago.
Satheesan said that "strange things happened" when this company purchased land in Palakkad.
"After the purchase was registered, the Pinarayi Vijayan government altered their Excise Policy and while no other companies engaged in this line knew it, Oasis was given the license to set up their plant in the land they purchased," he said.
Rebutting Rajesh's claim that when the Oasis plant becomes functional, the state will get a GST of Rs 210 crore, Satheesan said it is unfortunate that a Minister speaks like this as there is no GST for extra neutral alcohol.
"No one will forget what Rajesh often said about the acute water shortage that Palakkad is facing and now he is batting for the Oasis company. Equally important is to date, this company has not come out with any explanation when the issue is raging here," said Satheesan.
Veteran Congress leader and former Leader of Opposition Ramesh Chennithala said this issue has become the talking point in the ruling Left alliance as no one except Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and Rajesh knew about this "corrupt deal".
"I stand by what I have said that this is a big corrupt deal and Rajesh when caught on the wrong foot, now says that this plant will not create any water shortage in the district as they will have their own rainwater harvesting plant, which in no way, will be able to meet their water requirements," he said.
Meanwhile, with allies of the ruling CPI-M like the CPI and the JD-S expressing their displeasure of this issue not surfacing in the Left Democratic Front (LDF) meeting, another ally, the RJD, came out against this.
RJD top leader Varghese George on Thursday said that it's surprising that this issue was not discussed in the routine LDF meeting even when LDF Convenor T.P. Ramakrishnan himself is a former Excise Minister.
Palakkad Lok Sabha member V.K.Sreekandan, who defeated Rajesh in the 2019 Lok Sabha polls, said the entire deal is a shady and corrupt one and hence, a judicial probe has to be announced to find out what transpired.
