Thiruvananthapuram: The police have suspended an Assistant Sub-Inspector (ASI) on the charge of issuing a deceitful passport verification report to help an alleged gang leader and wanted man illegally procure a passport.

The suspended official was identified as ASI Mohanan attached to Anchal police station in Kollam district.

Arun Kumar Sinha, Inspector General of Police, South Zone, ordered the suspension on the basis of an inquiry that concluded that Mohanan had `suppressed' facts to help `Goondukadu' Shabu, an accused in several cases, get a passport issued from the Regional Passport Office here.

The city police had arrested Shabu on February 27 for allegedly using a fake passport to travel abroad in 2004. He was booked on the charges of violating the Indian Passport Act, forgery, impersonation and cheating.

K.C. Sasikumar, Assistant Commissioner, Fort, who is investigating the case, said the passport used by Shabu was issued in 2004 in the name of Sabu Divakaran of Cheruvilla Veedu, Kulathoorkonam, Pothenkulam, Kollam district. The photograph affixed on the passport was that of Shabu. Mr. Sasikumar said the ration card, SSLC certificate and electoral identity card submitted for police verification were forged. The residential address in the passport was also found to be false. Mr. Sasikumar said Shabu was not entitled to a passport because he was accused in several police cases.

Dubai visit

Shabu used the passport to travel to Dubai in 2005, said the police. He spent nearly five months in the country on a visit visa. The police said that Shabu also travelled to Kish, an Iranian city and free trade zone in the Persian Gulf. The police were trying to identify the persons who sponsored Shabu's sojourn in Dubai. An investigator said Shabu had paid a considerable sum of money for getting the police verification report written in his favour. The fake passport was later destroyed.

The police have got duplicate copies of the illegally procured travel document. They were collecting evidence from the Regional Passport Office and the Emigration Department. The police were also in touch with the Postal Department to find out how the `fake' passport was delivered to the suspect.

Shabu was arrested twice this year. On February 23, he was held on the charge of carrying a machete to a public meeting attended by Chief Minister V.S. Achuthanandan. Shabu later told the police that his life was under threat. He had been arrested a week earlier on the charge of attempting to extort money from a flat builder.

Shabu's brother, `Goondukadu' Shaji, who was murdered in the mid Nineties, was accused by the police, along with some Congressmen, of throwing country bombs at the AKG Centre, headquarters of the Communist Party of India(Marxist). Shabu is currently a member of the Barton Hill unit of the DYFI.

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