Kerala Legislative Assembly speaker P Sreeramakrishnan was quizzed by the Customs Department in connection with the probe into the US dollar smuggling case.
Sreeramakrishnan had earlier kept off from appearing before the Customs twice citing personal inconveniences. Hence, a Customs team came down to Speaker's official residence on Friday and took his statement.
According to the Speaker's office, the team from Kochi sought some clarifications from him and the whole process lasted for two to three hours.
The customs had earlier registered a case based on gold smuggling accused Swapna Nair's statement that US dollars worth Rs 1.9 crore were smuggled with the knowledge of the Speaker and the Speaker intended to make investments in educational institutions abroad.
Allegations of Sreeramakrishnan's nexus with the gold smuggling accused surfaced much earlier as he was found to have inaugurated a shop of one of the accused. But Sreeramakrishnan had been maintaining that he did not have any unholy nexus with the accused.
The other day Sreeramakrishnan had made a video post on social media alleging that a 'wretched creature' was unleashing a rumour that he (Sreeramakrishnan) tried to end life as his family life was shattered. He said that he was not a coward and he was willing to open up before any investigation agencies.
(Published 10 April 2021, 08:49 IST)
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