ThiruvananthapuramSeptember 23, 2025 01:58 PM IST
First published on: Sep 23, 2025 at 01:58 PM IST
The alleged suicide of a BJP councillor over a financial crisis in a cooperative society which he headed, has emerged as the latest flashpoint between the party and the ruling CPI(M) ahead of the civic body elections.
The blame game started after 52-year-old Thirumala ward councillor K Anil Kumar, the president of the cooperative venture Valiyasala Farm Tour Society and the general secretary of the BJP’s Thiruvananthapuram City unit, was found hanging at the ward office on Saturday.
In a suicide note attributed to him, Kumar wrote: “We are facing a crisis that is seen in all cooperative societies. Fixed deposits have been paid back while earlier sources of income like chit funds and daily deposits have ceased to exist. Depositors are exerting pressure and want their money back. There is a huge sum that needs to be recovered. Our people were helped… Neither I nor the governing body has caused anomalies in the society.”
The CPI(M) claims that “our people were helped” was a reference to the BJP. “The BJP leadership pocketed huge sums of money from the cooperative society. They cannot escape responsibility now. There is massive corruption in cooperative societies. Even in the Farm Tour Society, BJP leaders took huge loans and betrayed Kumar by not repaying them. He and his family should get justice. We will hold protest marches under the aegis of all local committees across the district,” CPI(M) district secretary and Varkala MLA V Joy said.
In response, the BJP has blamed the CPI(M)-police “nexus” for Kumar’s alleged suicide. Pointing out that the suicide note had no reference to the BJP, Union Minister V Muraleedharan said, “The reference to ‘our people’ is for those who had taken loans from the society or those close to him. It cannot be considered a political allegation.”
Calling for an impartial probe in the Kumar case, he said, “Kumar was pushed to suicide after the police threatened him following complaints by certain investors of the cooperative society.”
Muraleedharan also pointed to the case of CPI(M) councillor B Rajendran, who was sacked last week over corruption charges.
For the BJP, which is currently the principal Opposition in the Thiruvananthapuram Corporation and is hoping to wrest power from the CPI(M) in the next elections, the latest scam comes on the heels of a scandal in the Venganoor rural cooperative society, where too BJP leaders are facing accusations.
BJP state president Rajeev Chandrasekhar’s angry response to media queries on the issue has added fuel to the fire.
For the CPI(M), which has a considerable presence in the cooperative sector, the allegations have come handy to obscure corruption charges against its own civic body leaders. In Thrissur, the alleged scam at the CPI(M)-controlled Karuvannur cooperative bank is believed to have been key to BJP candidate Suresh Gopi’s victory from Thrissur in last year’s Lok Sabha elections.