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Thiruvananthapuram District Congress Committee (DCC) expelled one of its members, Anil Kumar, widely known as Chenthi Anil, from the primary membership of the party on Saturday, August 29, following a case registered against him for blocking Chief Minister VD Satheesan's vehicle. On the same day, Anil was arrested and subsequently remanded to 14 days of judicial custody.
The incident took place on the evening of August 28, when CM Satheesan was en route to Chempazhanthy, in Thiruvananthapuram, to attend a Sree Narayana Guru birth anniversary programme. Anil and a group of local event organisers waylaid the CM's convoy at Chenthi, demanding that he attend a local event. However, the CM refused, and there was a heated exchange between Anil and Satheesan.
Anil is a prominent Congress leader in the Sreekaryam-Chenthi region.
Visuals broadcast by Malayalam news channels showed Anil shouting and aggressively questioning the Chief Minister. The CM was also shouting at him. According to reports, the event in Chenthi was not included in the CM's itinerary.
Reports quoting the Chief Minister’s Office said that the CM had been advised against attending the event based on intelligence inputs and that his office had informed the organisers a week ago that he would be unable to attend.
However, speaking with the media during the arrest, Anil said the special branch and bomb squad had conducted a search at the event venue a day before.
Following the altercation, the Sreekaryam police booked Anil under sections 126(2) (Wrongful restraint), 351(2) (Criminal intimidation) and 132 (Assault or criminal force to deter a public servant from discharging duty).
According to reports, the remand report said Anil is in the rowdy list of the Sreekaryam police station and has several cases against him.
Later, he was produced in court and remanded for 14 days of judicial custody.
