UDF produced proof on Wednesday to show that Chief Minister V S Achuthanandan had misled the assembly on the ISRO land scandal.

Congress leader K C Venugopal gave notice for a privilege motion against  Achuthanandan for informing the house on Tuesday that ISRO had not contacted the government for identifying land for the proposed Indian Institute of Space Technology.

Venugopal pointed out that Dr B N Suresh, director of Vikram Sarabhai Space Centre (VSSC), had written to the government  in December last year requesting the government to make land available.

He produced copies of the letters by Dr Suresh to the government. The VSSC Director wrote to Revenue Minister K P Rajendran requesting for 100 acres of land in Thiruvananthapuram district at subsidised price. The minister passed it  to the District Collector who replied that enough land was not available. Following this, the VSSC advertised for land and received quotations from 17 persons.

Of these, Xavi Mano Mathew’s Merchiston Estate at the Ponmudi hill station was chosen. The Revenue Department gave the title deed of the land to Mathew. An agreement was struck for transfer of 82 acres at Rs 3.26 crore. Though   Mathew requested the Forest Department to denotify the land to enable the transfer to ISRO, it was not denotified.

Dr Suresh later wrote to   Achuthanandan in May requesting that he direct the forest department to denotify the forest land since the prestigious project was getting delayed.

The Chief Minister passed it on to the forest minister. However, the Congress has said that the Forest Minister Benoy Viswam had facilitated the transfer of the forest land at an inflated price to the ISRO. He said Mathew had purchased the land at a throwaway price.

Meanwhile, a report from Delhi says that the PMO has denied that the PM had any plans to visit Kerala for laying the foundation stone for institute.