THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: The customs will grill chief minister’s former IT Fellow Arun Balachandran today. A notice has been issued asking him to appear at the customs office in Kochi. Arun Balachandran was a close confidante of former IT secretary M Sivasankar. He was ousted from the IT department following allegations of booking rooms for the accused in the gold smuggling case.

In addition to Arun, another journalist has also been summoned for interrogation. The customs had earlier found that journalist Anil Nambiar and Swapna Suresh had spoken on the phone twice on the day the gold was seized at the Thiruvananthapuram Airport. Anil is being questioned to examine it. The customs will also grill some others who were in touch with Swapna. Some of them had helped Swapna to go underground.