Kochi: In a fresh development in the case related to the controversial import of holy books and dates, the Ministry of External Affairs has given the go-ahead to the Customs department to serve notices to former diplomats of the UAE Consulate in Thiruvananthapuram which was also under scrutiny over gold smuggling.
The permission has been granted for sending notices to the former consul general and attaché. The issue concerns 17,000 kg dates that were brought from the UAE to the consulate.
A portion of the dates were distributed by the consulate directly to the institutions under the Kerala social justice department.
The Customs had received information that gold smuggling case accused Swapna Suresh and V S Sarith had personally reached to take the consignment of dates that arrived at the Cochin Port in a container in 2017.
The then social justice department director T V Anupama had given a statement that there was no exchange of letters between the state government and the UAE Consulate in connection with the import of 17,000 kg dates.
In the statement given before Customs officials who were investigating the case, Anupama disclosed that the scheme to distribute dates to the children of orphanages was implemented on the verbal direction of M Sivasankar, the then principal secretary to the chief minister, and the dates were imported without paying tax.
The Customs had registered two cases in connection with the import of dates and holy books.
Sivasankar was suspended from service over his links to the gold smugglers and was booked by the Customs. After a brief stay in the jail he was released in bail. Recently, he was reinstated by the Kerala government.
