The infamous Suryanelli sex scandal has returned to haunt Rajya Sabha deputy chairperson P.J. Kurien, with the rape victim writing to Kerala’s standing counsel in the Supreme Court to examine whether she could file a review petition to make him stand trial.
The victim, now working as a last grade employee in the sales tax department, iterates that Prof. Kurien, then minister of state for industries, raped her twice at the Panchayat Guest House in Kumily (Idukki) on February 19, 1996. She recognised Prof. Kurien from a newspaper photo.
In the letter sent to the standing counsel, Mr Uday Chander Singh, dated January 29, the victim pointed out that the Supreme Court had neither summoned nor gave her an opportunity to present her case and that the police officials had tried to save the influential Prof. Kurien. Although she had stated the fact of the rape to probe officers, none of them had lent it any credence. The probe teams, one after the other, exonerated Prof. Kurien when she lodged a private complaint at the judicial first class magistrate court in Peermade.
The magistrate recorded her statement and summoned Prof. Kurian. But he approached the high court, which rejected his plea. He then got a discharge order from the Supreme Court, quashing all proceedings at the magistrate court.
The case had kicked up a storm in Kerala, putting the ruling UDF on the backfoot in 1996. Although probe officials found little evidence to nail Prof. Kurien, the Left led a successful poll campaign on the sex scandal and assumed power in 1997.
The late Kerala CM E.K. Nayanar got his favourite officer, Mr Siby Mathews, to probe but he also came up with the finding that the charge was baseless. The top court upheld the probe reports and ruled in 2005 that Prof. Kurien did not have to stand trial. But the victim now contends the SC never heard her.
and that she be given an opportunity to apprise the court of the brutality inflicted on her allegedly by a senior politician.