Thiruvananthapuram: A row over bar licences handed to hotels without the excise minister's knowledge landed on the government's table on Tuesday, with the opposition CPI(M) asking a blunt question. "Who is ruling Keralam?" senior party leader P. Rajeev said at a press briefing.
Answering himself, Rajeev said Chief Minister V.D. Satheesan and "sponsors" were running the state and taking administrative decisions without the knowledge of the ministers concerned.
CPI(M) state secretary M.V. Govindan joined in, saying approvals were being issued without the minister being told. Under the previous LDF government, he said, bar licences for hotels rated above three stars were issued only after a thorough assessment of the establishments. "Now, licences are being given without the knowledge of the minister. That is the surprising part," he said.
Govindan also picked up the chief minister's directive to cancel an order sanctioning repair works worth over Rs 1 crore at Cliff House, the official residence. "First they allow it, and then they withdraw it when some problem occurs. It shows their double standards," he alleged. He added that the CPI(M) was not afraid of any investigation into the licences.
The minister at the centre of it, M. Liju, said on Monday that the government would investigate whether officials had shown "unwanted hastiness" in granting liquor licences to bars. He claimed that under existing rules, framed by the previous LDF government, licences could be issued within 24 hours, even to bars that had been shut for years, and that the Excise Commissioner had not been informed.
No official response from the ruling side to Tuesday's allegations was reported.
The political maths is simple. Either the minister was kept out of a decision in his own department, in which case the chief minister has some explaining to do, or the minister knew and the government has to defend the speed of the approvals. Neither answer is comfortable before the assembly session.