P P Divya
Credit: Facebook/P P Divya
Kannur (Kerala): A Kerala court on Friday granted CPI(M) leader P P Divya's custody to the police for six hours for being questioned in the Additional District Magistrate Naveen Babu suicide case.
The Judicial First Class Magistrate (JFCM) court allowed the police to question Divya, accused of abetting the suicide of Babu, till 5 PM.
The police had sought her custody for two days.
Subsequently, she was questioned at the Kannur Town police station by the investigation team.
Meanwhile, the Thalassery Principal District Sessions Court adjourned Divya's bail application to Tuesday.
The day also saw the Congress carrying out a protest march to the collectorate seeking action against District Collector Arun K Vijayan.
The protest was led by Kerala Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) chief K Sudhakaran, who said the Collector should have had the courage to stop Divya from making her allegations.
The KPCC chief also alleged that the Collector was trying to help Divya by saying that Babu had later admitted to making a mistake.
He said that the Collector should be ready to rectify his stand.
Sudhakaran also alleged that Divya was being involved in corrupt activities.
After his speech concluded, the police used water cannons several times to disperse the protestors, but were unsuccessful.
Protestors also clashed with the police present at the collectorate.
The Congress protest came a couple of days after it alleged that the Collector was forced to say that his former colleague -- the late ADM Naveen Babu -- had admitted to committing a mistake following the graft allegations against him.
According to the Collector's statement to the police, after the farewell function, in which Divya had levelled corruption allegations against the ADM, Babu met Vijayan in his chamber and said that he had committed a mistake.
The Collector on Friday told reporters here that he was sticking to what he said in the statement given to the police.
Babu's family, on the other hand, said he would not have made any admission of mistake before the Collector.
Babu's wife said that he was not that close to the Collector for him to make any such submission.
She also said that she did not like the Collector's body language in the video of the send-off event and claimed that had he consoled Babu after the allegations by Divya, what had happened could have been prevented.
Attending Babu's send-off function allegedly uninvited on October 14, Divya had criticised him for delaying approval for a petrol pump in Chengalai for several months and remarked he had okayed it only two days after being transferred, hinting she knew the reasons behind the sudden approval.
The following day, Babu was found dead at his quarters in Kannur.
Divya had moved the Thalassery Sessions Court on October 19, seeking anticipatory bail after the police registered a case against her for abetting the suicide of the ADM under Section 108 of the Bharatiya Nagarik Suraksha Sanhita (BNSS).
The sessions court on October 29 rejected her anticipatory bail plea, following which she was arrested and remanded to judicial custody for 14 days.