Right to Information (RTI) activist Gireesh Babu (47) from Kerala was discovered dead on the first floor of his Kalamassery home in Ernakulam on Monday morning. Gireesh was responsible for numerous legal disputes that led to political controversies, including the most recent allegation of a payoff by Cochin Minerals and Rutile Limited (CMRL) to Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and his daughter Veena Vijayan.
Since he needed to visit the High Court about a case, he had asked his wife to wake him up at around 7 a.m. Around 6:45 a.m., his wife persistently knocked on his door, but he was unresponsive, and his door was barred from the inside.
After that, neighbors smashed part of the door and unbolted it. Gireesh was discovered face down on the bed. He had been receiving therapy for conditions involving his brain for some time.
An inquest was convened when the Kalamassery police were notified, and the body was discovered. Kalamassery police have registered a case of unnatural death.
Gireesh, a film production controller, later switched to active public work. He is the petitioner in many cases, like the Palarivattam bridge scam involving former minister V K Ebrahim Kunju, pollution in Periyar river, and, most recently, the monthly case against Vijayan and his daughter Veena.
In March 2021, HinduPost reported that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) had issued notices to MLA V K Ebrahim Kunju to appear before investigating officers in a money laundering case worth ten crores. Kunju is the Indian Union Muslim League (IUML) MLA (a long-standing ally of the Congress) from Kalamassery in the Ernakulam district of Kerala. He is currently under investigation for other financial discrepancies that he initiated when he was the Public Works Minister in the previous United Democratic Front (UDF) government.
Vijayan and Veena found themselves in trouble after an Income Tax department report about the Kochi-based Cochin Minerals and Rutile Limited (CMRL) recently surfaced. It alleged that CMRL made “illegal payments” of Rs 1.72 crore to Veena’s information technology firm, Exalogic Solutions Private Limited, over three years.
The report claimed that CMRL officials informed the Income Tax Appellate Board that the money was paid even though Veena’s company did not provide any service. Following the CMRL payoff row involving Veena, the Congress alleged that her husband Muhammed Riyas, a CPI(M) leader and Minister for Public Works, failed to disclose this payment in his election affidavit when he contested from the Beypore Assembly constituency in the 2021 assembly elections.
