With the special investigation team given the full charge to probe the case based on the Hema Committee report, which brought out the pitiable condition of women in the Malayalam film industry, the SIT under the watchful eyes of the special bench of the Kerala High Court will be meeting 50 people first. The SIT comprises four woman IAS officers who have split into four teams. The teams will meet the 50 people who testified before the Hema Committee, based on which the report was prepared and submitted to the Pinarayi Vijayan government in 2019.
The SIT has planned to complete this exercise in 10 days.
On Thursday, the SIT was handed over the uncensored version of the Hema Committee report by the special bench of the court. The Vijayan government came under flak from both the Congress and the BJP.
The special bench met for the first time on Tuesday and came down heavily on the Vijayan government pointing out the inaction of the state government, including not registering FIRs even though the Kerala Police got the report in 2020.
The SIT has 11 FIRs which were filed against various film personalities after former actresses revealed to the media how they were exploited. The Court has also asked the SIT that it could take necessary action on the offences revealed in the report. And if the victim or survivor is not interested in prosecuting the case, they can drop it. But at least some action should be taken, the court said.
Presently those who are in the dock include actor-turned-CPI(M) legislator Mukesh Madhavan, Nivin Pauly, Siddique, Jayasurya, Edavela Babu, Maniyanpilla Raju, directors Ranjith and Prakash, and production executives Vichu and Noble. Mukesh, Ranjith, and Raju have secured relief from the court.
Disclaimer: This post has been auto-published from an agency feed without any modifications to the text and has not been reviewed by an editor