Jomon’s Abhaya case-oriented book ready for release

The
autobiography of Jomon Puthenpurakkal of Kottayam, who had pursued the
Sr Abhaya murder case from where the Crime Branch of Kerala Police had
concluded it as a case of suicide in 1993 till now, is ready for
release. Chief Minister VS Achuthanandan will release the book, titled
Abhaya Case Diary.

Jomon, who as the convener of the Sr Abhaya
Action Council had effectively interfered in the case whenever the
investigations seemed hitting hard walls, has described in the
autobiography all developments in the case right from the finding of
the body of Sr Abhaya in the well of St Pius X Convent, Kottayam where
she was a nun, on the morning of March 27, 1992.

The history of
the case till the arrest of three Knanaya Catholic Church
personalities, Fr Thomas M Kottoor, Fr Jose Puthrukayil and Sr Seffi on
November 19, 2008, is described in detail in the autobiography. He
alleged in the book that KM Mani, Kerala Congress (M) chairman and
former minister, had made interventions in the case in Delhi at every
stage when the CBI was on the verge of arresting the culprits. Mani had
denied the allegation earlier.

He also describes in the book
events like the alleged efforts of the local police and Crime Branch to
sabotage the investigations into the murder and to distort and destroy
evidences in the case. Jomon, as Sr Abhaya Action Council convener, had
intervened in the case in 1993 by lobbying in Delhi to get a CBI probe
launched into the murder. Jomon had recently said that the arrest of
the three accused and the subsequent revelations were proof of the
power of truth.

However, Jomon had to face the wrath of the
Judiciary when on August 26, 2008 Justice V Ramkumar banned him from
the court on the observation that he was filing public interest
litigations just for earning fame. The judge said Jomon was pretending
to be a super investigator, who was capable of giving advices even to
the CBI.

His position vis-a-vis the Abhaya case became more
critical when the same judge two days later launched a thorough enquiry
into the sources of his funds and relations with legal authorities and
his influences in the corridors of power in the State capital.

Justice
Ramkumar on August 28, 2006 asked the Director General of Police to
constitute a special team of officials to hold probe against Jomon. He
also instructed the DGP to be careful to include sincere and efficient
officials in the team.

Apart from imposing a Rs 5,000 fine on
him, the court also banned him from filing any public interest
petitions till this probe announced over. The instruction to the DGP
was to complete the probe in six months.

Meanwhile, the Chief
Judicial Magistrate, Ernakulam, ordered examination by experts of the
three digital video cassettes brought by the CBI team probing the
Abhaya case, in the presence of a lawyers’ commission. The court would
hand over the tapes to the CBI team headed by Deputy SP Nandakumaran
Nair.

The CBI had requested the court to hand over the DV tapes,
containing the original recordings of the narco-analyses procedures on
the three accused to it for experts’ examination and for copying the
recordings onto CDs. The court had then asked the CBI counsel to submit
the request in writing.

The CBI team had on Monday submitted to
the CJM Court the original recordings of the narco-analyses of the
three accused, carried out at the Central Forensic Sciences Laboratory,
Bangalore. The CBI team had brought the three original digital video
cassettes containing the recordings of the procedures from the lab.

The
agency had taken possession of the DV tapes as per an instruction from
the single bench judge of the HC, who was monitoring the
investigations. A team of the agency had taken the statements of the
lab’s director PM Mohan, Asst Director S Malini and two other doctors
last week.

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