The curious case of shrunken underwear and Kerala Minister

The State of Kerala has recently been embroiled in a rather unique political controversy which also happens to highlight the snail's pace at which legal proceedings move..The tale begins in April 1990. An Australian man, one Andrew Salvatore Cervelli was arrested at the Thiruvananthapuram airport for allegedly smuggling 61.5 grams of hashish by concealing it in his underwear. He was convicted under the provisions of the Narcotic Drugs and Psychotropic Substances Act, 1985, and sentenced to undergo 10 years of rigorous imprisonment..But, there was soon a twist in the tale. When Cervelli approached the Kerala High Court in appeal against his conviction and sentence, it was found that the underwear in evidence was much too small to fit him, and smaller than the recorded size. The High Court acquitted Cervelli, who was represented then by a junior lawyer named Antony Raju. .Cervelli went back to Australia in the hope of leading a quiet, peaceful life. But alas, that wasn't the case. Not too long after he returned, he was arrested in Victoria on a murder charge. While in jail, he supposedly told other inmates about his escapades in India, especially a tale of how he managed to hoodwink Indian police and courts. .The Australian National Central Bureau quickly informed the concerned Indian authorities that when Cervelli's co-accused in the murder case was being interviewed, he had revealed that Cervelli's family and lawyers had allegedly bribed a court official and either swapped or altered the underwear that was in evidence.The investigating officer in the case soon approached the Kerala High Court seeking a probe into the alleged evidence tampering. Subsequently, police in Thiruvananthapuram registered a case against Antony Raju and a court clerk..Even though Raju was chargesheeted in 2006, the trial did not begin until 2014. Coincidentally, Raju was standing as a candidate in the assembly polls which were scheduled for just a month later. .Given the short attention span of the public and the media, the case was all but forgotten until a week ago, when a Judicial Magistrate (First Class) in Thiruvananthapuram ordered the police to produce all the files relevant to the now 16-year-old case, which had its genesis in a 32-year-old case.The charge sheet names Raju and court clerk Jose, who are accused of having committed offences such as conspiracy, cheating, destruction of evidence, fabrication of evidence, breach of public faith, among others. .Raju is currently the State Transport Minister and the leader of the Janadhipathya Kerala Congress party, which is part of the ruling Left Democratic Front coalition. In the wake of the public furore about the unique case and the opposition's attempts to weaponise the same, the Kerala High Court Registry sought a report on the delay in the trial..On Wednesday, a petitioner approached the Kerala High Court invoking its jurisdiction under Article 227 of the Constitution of India, seeking orders under Section 483 of the Code of Criminal Procedure for expediting the investigation and trial. The case is currently listed before the magistrate court for consideration on August 4..Interestingly, the underwear episode even made its way to the silver screen, with the exact story being retold in the 1991 movie Aanaval Mothiram, released a year after the incident.

The curious case of shrunken underwear and Kerala Minister

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