Will seek court permission to shift Chandrasekharan murder

Kerala government today said it would seek permission of the trial court to shift the Chandrasekharan murder case accused suspected to have used mobile phones in their cells to access Facebook accounts, as shown in a sting by a TV channel.
"Only with the permission of the court which remanded the accused can they be shifted to some other place. Since they are remand prisoners, permission of the Special Additional Sessions Court, the trial court in the case, has to be sought," Home Minister Thiruvanchoor Radhakrishnan said.
Speaking to mediapersons after visiting the district prison here where the accused have been lodged, the minister said he suspected they had used the mobile phones either due to malfunctioning of jammers or changes in frequency and added the technical faults if any would be rectified.

Government was considering installing sensors to detect mobile phone calls, he said, adding firms dealing with sensor equipment would be approached.
The minister, who was speaking after chairing a meeting with top police officials on the matter, said a high-level enquiry team has been constituted and asked to submit its report immediately.
Steps would be taken to avoid lapses in jail security and action taken once it was received, he said.

Radhakrishnan said government had conducted raids in the district jail here soon after coming to know the accused had used mobile phones to access their Facebook accounts.
The accused in the case were found to have made Facebook postings, apparently using sophisticated mobile phones in their possession. The matter was exposed through a sting operation by a Malayalam TV channel.

The channel also beamed photographs purportedly posted on Facebook by some key accused in the murder case after they were lodged in the prison as undertrials.
Chandrasekharan, who floated his own outfit Revolutionary Marxist Party (RMP) after quitting CPI(M), was hacked to death in May 2012 near his native village Onchiyam. Many of the accused in the case are local CPI(M) workers, apart from goons hired to execute the murder.