Thiruvananthapuram | The opposition Congress in Kerala on Thursday slammed the LDF government over its Rs 232 crore AI camera initiative by terming it as a "massive, systematic and planned" corruption that was centered around the office of Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan.
Senior Congress leader and former Leader of Opposition in the Assembly Ramesh Chennithala, who was the first one to raise allegations of corruption and irregularities in connection with the project, claimed that the common man was being looted to fill the coffers of companies of friends and relatives of the ruling Left front.
He alleged the Kerala CM was the "prime accused" in the scam as everything happened with his knowledge and approval.
Chennithala, at a press conference here, also ridiculed State Industries MInister P Rajeev's announcement of an inquiry into the matter by the Principal Secretary, Industries, saying that it was an attempt to "whitewash" the corruption that took place "under the guise of the Safe Kerala project".
Similar allegations were also made by Leader of Opposition (LoP) in the Assembly V D Satheesan, who contended that the Chief Minister's Office was at the centre of major scams like the gold smuggling through diplomatic bags, Life Mission fraud and now the AI camera related corruption.
The CMO has not yet reacted to these allegations.
Both the Congress leaders, at separate press conferences held here, also raised a number of questions like why Bengaluru-based SRIT was awarded the contract when it was neither technically or financially qualified nor an Original Equipment Manufacturer (OEM) or an authorised vendor of the same as was required under the tender conditions.
Satheesan, speaking to reporters, alleged that SRIT and some other companies, which were also not technically qualified and were connected to each other, formed a cartel and participated in the tender in such a manner that the Bengaluru-based company won the bid.
The LoP also questioned why the project was launched with much fanfare when there was a Vigilance probe underway against a Transport department official in connection with the AI cameras.
Both Congress leaders further asked why the details of the Vigilance probe was not disclosed before the cabinet in a note placed before it by State Transport Minister Antony Raju recently.
They also claimed that neither the government nor any of its ministers have been able to answer any of the queries raised by them regarding the project.
Chennithala further said that Rajeev was able to talk very casually about the entire matter and deny the allegations as he has no responsibility for the project which was planned before he became the Industries Minister.
Satheesan said that once Rajeev has denied there was any corruption in connection with the AI camera procurement, how will the Principal Secretary Industries, who answers to the minister, say anything that is contrary.
Both Chennithala and Satheesan said that there were several brands of cameras in the market which carried all the specifications that the AI cameras had, but were much cheaper and came with warranties and five-year maintenance guarantees.
However, in the instant case, besides the contract amount of Rs 151 crore to install the cameras, an additional Rs 66 crore has been set aside for maintenance of the same, they alleged and claimed that all this points to a large-scale corruption in the implementation of the project.
Chennithala said the cameras should not be called Artificial Intelligence (AI) cameras and should be termed as Automatic Number Plate Recognition (ANPR) cameras.
"AI is a process, a system and it is only one per cent of the camera. It is actually an ANPR camera. An even better name for it is corruption camera," the senior Congress leader said.
Satheesan, during his interaction with the media, also alleged some Kannur-based companies as well as Kozhikode-based Uralungal Labour Contract Co-operative Society were linked to SRIT and were behind the AI camera scam.
Since Vijayan inaugurated the Safe Kerala project last week, the Congress has been vocal about its opposition to the initiative and alleged there were irregularities and corruption involved in awarding the contracts.
