Thiruvananthapuram, Wednesday 12 August 2009: The writ petition filed by CPM state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan challenging the Kerala Governor RS Gavai’s decision to prosecute him in the sensational 300 billion crores SNC Lavalin scam was returned by the Apex Court today.

Pinarayi Vijayan filed the writ petition at the Apex Court on Monday through senior lawyer PH Parekh.

The petition was filed in the wake of increasing speculation on the delay of filing petition by the comrade who is accused of wrongfully awarding a contract to Canadian company SNC Lavalin for of two power plants when he was the state power minister in 1997. Pinarayi Vijayan is the seventh accused in the case. Among the accused is an official of SNC Lavalin and also the Canadian company itself.

The other six are all former officials of the Kerala State Electricity Board.

According to reports, Pinarayi expects to get a stay as he is supposed to appear before the trial court on 24th next month. In his petition Pinarayi vijayan has alleged that, the Governor cannot over rule the decision of state cabinet and while giving consent the Governor has not abided the guidelines of Supreme Court.

In the progress report filed by the CBI Chennai unit DYSP, V Ashok Kumar, before the CBI Special court, here, it has been stated that Vijayan, a former Power minister, should be arraigned as the seventh accused as while serving as Electricity Minister between May 1996 and October 1998 he colluded with K Mohanachandran, Principal Secretary (Power) and joined criminal conspiracy which was already hatched in 1995 by R Sivadasan, former KSEB chairman and others in the matter of awarding supply contracts of the projects to Lavalin.

Vijayan had led a high level delegation to Canada in October 1996 and held discussions with SNC Lavalin and Export Development Corporation International Development agency regarding the contract and took a decision in awarding the supply contracts to Lavalin at a fixed rate basis, the investigating agency said.

The main consideration in the award of the contract, which was signed by KSEB on February 10, 1997 without government approval, was the grant offered for establishment of Malabar Cancer Centre (MCC) at Thalassery in Kannur district.

The E Balanandan committee, appointed by the Kerala government, in its report had opined that the complete replacement of the machinery need not be carried out for the hydel projects and essential parts alone need to be replaced for which the estimated cost will be around Rs 100.5 crore.

CBI said Vijayan along with then Chief Minister, late E K Nayanar and late Dr V Rajagopal, then KSEB chairman, again visited Canada during June 1997 where the grant amount to establish the MCC was decided at Rs 100 crore.

The CBI stated that Vijayan along with other accused had ‘fraudulently with dishonest intention’ of showing undue favour to SNC Lavalin entered into only a ‘non binding’ memorandum of understanding on April 25, 1998 for MCC instead of a legally valid MOA which facilitated Lavlin to back out from the commitment later, thereby ‘cheating the government.’ Lavlin, taking advantage of the non binding agreement, backed out of the commitment after spending only about Rs 12 crore through its consultants, thus not financing MCC to the tune of Rs 86.25 crore.

As part of the criminal conspiracy Vijayan, Mohanachandran and A Francis and others placed a crucial note for approval before the council of ministers on Mar 3, 1998, after suppressing various facts, including the fact that MOU route was dispensed with the Union government, full report of the National Hydel Electric power corporation was not highlighted and concurrence of Central Electrical Authority, and obtained cabinet approval, CBI stated.

Vijayan also had close contacts with SNC Lavalin officials and by abusing his official position had exerted ‘high pressure’ on the staff of KSEB and thereby favoured Lavalin in their official dealings with KSEB, CBI said.

The investigations revealed that supply contract for renovation and modernisation of the Panniyar, Shengulam and Pallivasal hydel projects was given to SNC Lavalin at an exorbitant rate and the per MW cost for the same was the highest. This caused a loss to the Kerala government with corresponding wrongful gain to Lavalin, CBI said.