Two Youth Congress activists—Sarathlal (24) and Krupesh (19)—were hacked to death by three motorcycle-borne men on February 17, 2019 in Periya village in Kasaragod. A. Peethambaran, a local leader of CPM, is the prime accused in the case.
The parents of the victims had moved the high court seeking a CBI investigation, saying Kerala police's investigation was not on the right track.
The Left government strongly opposed the CBI probe into the case and had roped in high-profile lawyers to challenge the high court order. It argued in the court that it was not proper to say the state police's investigation was not in the right direction just because the accused are members of the ruling party.
The top court, however, upheld the HC order of August 25 and directed the state police to hand over all the documents related to the case to the CBI.
There is nothing surprising about the SC order. This was a case defeat, which government had ‘asked for’. This need not be last one.
This has once again exposed the pauperism of people who have been giving advices to the government. Other than exposing this fault, the case didn’t earn anything beneficial for the government.

It was based on facts and reasons that the high court division bench had ordered the continuation of the probe by the CBI.
In order to oppose the CBI probe, the government had pointed out that the Crime Branch was able to arrest all the accused.
But the high court ordered a CBI probe, citing that all accused were CPM local leaders and hence the probe need not be fair.

The court had also asked the Crime Branch to hand over all documents related to the case to the CBI but the Crime Branch was sitting on the files, thinking that the government would win its case in the Supreme Court.

As the case will now be probed by the CBI, let us hope that many truths will be revealed.
Secrets behind the conspiracy has to come out and more names linked to the case will have to come out.

All knows that political reasons are behind the government’s move but they should have considered the inconsolable sorrow of the victims’ families too. Isn’t it?
Meanwhile, the victims in Periya case were not the ones who deserved such a bloody end.
They dreamt about good future and like any Samaritan interfered in the local issues.
All those who have not been affected by political blindness would be praying that the ill-fate of the two victims of political violence doesn’t befall any other person.

It was on September 30, 2019 that the high court ordered handing over the case to the CBI.

The government that should have stood with the victim has not done so in the Periya case. And now, they have expensed a big amount from the public exchequer towards conducting the trial.

This move of the government also created an impression in the public that it was having something to hide.
The high court had not cancelled the chargesheet prepared by the Crime branch but it ordered to hand over the case to CBI after being convinced that there were serious lapses in its probe.
There was no witnesses in the case. Therefore the court had instructed the examination of the CCTV visuals but it was not done.
The victims’ families had pleaded with the court to order probe into top political persons’ role in the murder.

Now there are hints that this will come under the purview of the probe in the light of Supreme Court’s order.
In most murder cases, the demand will be for a CBI probe as the victims’’ relatives want a fair probe.
But now, it is a rare instant when the State government itself has approached the apex court against the CBI probe.

If the money spent for this had been spent for some other good purpose, at least the people of the state would have benefited out of it.