ED drops case against poor Dalit farmers after facing heat
Following significant public outcry, reports suggest that the Enforcement Directorate (ED) is inclined to terminate its case against two Dalit farmers from Tamil Nadu, namely, 72-year-old Kannaiyan and his 66-year-old brother Krishnan, who were served a summons in July 2023 on allegations of “money laundering”.
Various political parties and activists expressed their condemnation on social media platforms regarding the six-month-old summons, which specifically highlighted the caste affiliation of the elderly farmers.
Additionally, the brothers are entangled in a land dispute involving a regional BJP official.
Significantly, on December 28, 2021, a trial court acquitted both Krishnan and Kannaiyan. Despite this , the ED proceeded to investigate the case under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) in March 2022, prompted by a communication from the Tamil Nadu Forest Department regarding the incident.
The controversy arose when a summons issued on July 5, 2023 surfaced on social media platforms after six months. Political parties and activists in Tamil Nadu were particularly offended by the ED’s inclusion of the farmers’ caste in both the summons and ECIR (Enforcement Case Information Report), akin to an FIR.
Although the ED attributed the mention of caste to a clerical error, this explanation failed to pacify the escalating discontent.
Declining to discuss the rationale behind the registration of a case under the PPMLA against the senior farmers, a leading source from the agency’s office in Chennai remarked, “It was an oversight on our part. The situation was exaggerated by social media prior to Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit to Tamil Nadu.”
Furthermore, the envelope containing the ED summons for the brothers specified their caste as ‘Hindu Pallars’, a detail the agency later ascribed to a “clerical error”.
