IndiaPosted at: Oct 21 2026 8:57PM


SC pauses CMRL-Exalogic probe for a week, asks Kerala HC to hear Pinarayi Vijayan’s appeal

Parmod Kumar

New Delhi, Oct 21 (UNI) The Supreme Court on Wednesday put on hold for a week the investigation into alleged irregularities in financial transactions between Cochin Minerals and Rutile Limited (CMRL) and Exalogic Solutions Private Limited, enabling former Kerala Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan and others to pursue their appeal before a division bench of the Kerala High Court against a single-judge order directing registration of an FIR and consequent investigation.

A bench comprising Justice Joymalya Bagchi and Justice V. Mohana declined at this stage to interfere with the registration of the FIR itself, but expressed concern that the High Court had ordered the probe without hearing Vijayan and the other persons affected by its direction.

The bench noted that the Kerala government had already constituted a Special Investigation Team to conduct a preliminary enquiry when complainant K.M. Shajahan approached the High Court seeking registration of an FIR.
The petition was filed a day after the constitution of the SIT, and the single judge subsequently directed the Vigilance and Anti-Corruption Bureau to register a case on the basis of information supplied by the Enforcement Directorate.

The Supreme Court set aside the division bench order which had declined to permit Vijayan and the others to pursue their appeal and said their challenge to the single-judge order should be heard on merits. It stayed further investigation for a week to enable them to pursue that remedy and seek interim relief before the High Court.

The bench also cautioned the Enforcement Directorate against stepping into the statutory domain of other investigating agencies. It said the ED should not use its powers to compel another agency to act beyond what the law requires of it.

The court further observed that its judgment in Vijay Madanlal Choudhary could not be read as creating an automatic statutory mandate requiring a State agency to register an FIR merely because the ED had forwarded information indicating possible offences.
Senior advocate Sidharth Luthra, appearing for Vijayan, argued that the single judge had passed the order without hearing him and had treated Section 66(2) inconsistently — at one stage as imposing a mandate and elsewhere as requiring some degree of verification.

Counsel for Shajahan maintained that the Vijay Madanlal judgment required the State authorities to act once the ED forwarded information indicating cognizable offences.

Appearing for the ED, senior advocate Zoheb Hossain submitted that the material disclosed commission of cognizable offences. The bench said that may be so, but the larger question was whether such disclosure by the ED, by itself, obliged another agency to register an FIR in a corruption case.

The case concerns alleged transactions between CMRL and Exalogic, a company owned by Vijayan’s daughter Veena Thaikkandiyil.
Vijayan, Veena, her husband Mohammed Riyas and others approached the Supreme Court after a Kerala High Court division bench declined to permit them to pursue an appeal against the single-judge order on the ground that they had not been parties to Shajahan’s writ petition.
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Tags: #SC pauses CMRL-Exalogic probe for a week# asks Kerala HC to hear Pinarayi Vijayan’s appeal
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