Why Kerala politicians see red & yellow in his journalism

Last week,the former activist of the CPM’s youth wing had reasons to sit back and smile. One of his cover stories,followed up with a public interest litigation (PIL),had just hit the most powerful politician in Kerala,CPM’s state secretary Pinarayi Vijayan. “Crime was the first to expose the SNC Lavalin scam in 2001,with a report about the worthlessness of the equipment imported. Several documents regarding the scam were given by the late CPM leader E Balanandan,whose expert committee had advised Pinarayi against the deal. Balanandan was concerned that corruption should get exposed as no other media would dare to take on the powerful CPM,” says Nandakumar.

But for Nandakumar,the case would have died a natural death. It was his PIL that led to the CBI probe and whenever he felt the agency was developing cold feet,he would move the court again,and again—as many as seven times. “In 2005,I wrote about Pinarayi’s shady dealings in the Lavalin contract. Crime also said it was the late CPM leader Harkishan Singh Surjeet’s son who linked Pinarayi with Lavlin. Enraged by the expose,CPM activists set the magazine’s Kozhikode office on fire. Valuable documents were destroyed. Copies of Crime were seized from all bookstalls across the state and burned,” he says.

Nandakumar says the party has gone after him ever since. “Several bookstalls were threatened with dire consequences if they sold Crime. The bookhouses run by the party daily Deshabhimani were banned from selling Crime. One of its staff members was expelled for selling Crime. Now,the circulation (of Crime) has come down from 3 lakh to 60,000,” says Nandakumar.

Nandakumar had filed a petition in the High Court,alleging that Pinarayi had threatened to “finish him off.” The HC has referred the case to the lower court which is hearing the case on the attack on the magazine’s office.

*Pinarayi is not Crime’s lone target in the CPM. M A Baby,state minister and Central Committee member,filed a defamation case against him on a 1998 report which alleged that Baby misused his position as an MP to raise funds for a cultural organization that he ran.

*Nandakumar has filed another petition in the High Court seeking a probe into the wealth of Pinarayi,Baby and state Finance Minister TM Thomas Isaac.

*It’s not just the Left. Crime’s 1997 report on the Kozhikode ice cream parlour sex racket blew the lid off the scandal in which Muslim League leader P K Kunhalikutty was involved. The story was picked up by the mainstream media and the Left.

*In 2002,Nandakumar reported that Congress leader Shobana George was behind a fake intelligence report,leaked to a news channel,which linked her party colleague K V Thomas to a hawala racket.

*His reports on the alleged sexual harassment at the Catholic church-run Divine Retreat Centre in Thrissur led to a government inquiry and court intervention.

But his “investigative journalism” is often spiced up with a mix of sex and sleaze. Nandakumar proudly talks about an issue which chronicled the “perversions” of rich girls in a Kerala college that sold around “10 lakh copies.” Crime has published 60 “love letters” to “various girls” written by Kerala’s foremost public intellectual Sukumar Azhikode and now plans to bring out a collection.

“Crime is a yellow magazine. It does not even deserve the name of journalism. Crime’s growth and market should be seen as part of a systemic degeneration,” says a senior CPM leader. Says media analyst B R P Bhaskar: “Nandakumar has been engaged in muck-raking journalism which has its role in society. On many occasions,the mainstream media has been forced to follow up the scandals he brought out. Apart from exposing the scandals,he also takes the issues into the court,which give his stories more publicity.”

Nandakumar has so far faced 22 cases—mostly for defamation—but says he has only been “convicted only in three.” His appeals against convictions are pending in the High Court. Nandakumar says the allegation that his magazine—which has 25 employees including eight journalists on its payroll—peddles porn is baseless. “Crime has not carried obscene pictures or porn. To show my publication in poor light,several magazines were brought out under the same title. I went to the court and got them banned,” he says.