Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan smuggled foreign currency, says Swapna Suresh

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Swapna Suresh has come forward levelling serious allegations against Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan. In her statement to the show cause notice in the dollar smuggling case, she said the chief minister smuggled dollars. She revealed that during his first visit to the UAE in 2017, he smuggled the foreign currency through Ahmed Aldouki, a diplomat at the UAE Consulate.

Aldouki handed over the currency to the chief minister, who was in UAE. It was Sarith who bought the currency as per the instructions of Sivasankar and handed it over to Aldouki. Sarith stated that the packet for the chief minister was accepted from an official identified as Harikrishnan of the Public Administration Department. Sarith said an X-ray scan found a bundle of currency in the packet and that the Consulate General had given him 1000 dollars as tip for the transaction.

Meantime, M Sivasankar had confirmed handing over the packet to the chief minister. Sivasankar explained that it was the gift for the UAE delegation handed over. Sivasankar said that he just knows that the gift was delivered on time and don’t know by whom it was sent.