Senior CPIM leader and former Kerala local self-government minister AC Moideen will not appear before the Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Thursday (Aug 31) for interrogation in connection with the multi-crore Karuvannur Cooperative Bank scam.

AC Moideen communicated his inability to appear before the ED on Thursday stating that he was unable to gather the required income tax return documents spanning over ten years due to the ongoing vacation in the institutions for Onam. He informed the ED that he would make himself available for questioning at a later date.

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The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday issued a summons to AC Moideen asking him to appear for interrogation at 11 am on August 31 at its Kochi office in the money laundering case related to the Karuvanannur Service Co-operative Bank loan scandal

The ED’s notice to Moideen comes a day after it seized 36 properties valued at Rs 15 crore, including Rs 28 lakh in fixed deposits in the names of Moideen and his wife.

Meanwhile, the former manager of the Karuvannur Bank, Biju Karim, and other accused P P Kiran, and Anil Seth appeared at the ED office in Kochi on Wednesday for questioning in the case. The ED has found that Rs 150 crore had been swindled from the bank

The ED reportedly found that AC Moideen MLA is behind the crores of Benami loans in Karuvannur Bank. The ED also stated that the Benami took the loan by mortgaging the land of the poor without their knowledge

The ED sources said that Moideen instructed the bank manager to release loans to non-members of the bank who possessed no proper mortgage documents. Now ED is checking whether these loans were issued illegally to his benamis

The ED has on Tuesday conducted raids at the houses of Moideen and his four aides- Kiran P P, Rahim C M, Shiju M K, and Satheesh Kumar P. The ED considers these four aides as Moideen’s benamis The Central agency has found that KiranPP has received Rs 25 crore through fraud.

The bank fraud came to light a few years ago when several borrowers received recovery notices for amounts greater than they had borrowed.