After DySP Harikumar's death, his friend surrenders

Thiruvananthapuram: K Binu, the private money-lender who had whisked the deceased DySP Harikumar from the spot where he pushed Sanalkumar to death, surrendered before the Crime Branch (CB) on Tuesday. Along with Binu was Ramesh, who the CB sources said was the driver of the car in which Harikumar and Binu escaped across the border.

The CB sources, however, were not willing to reveal anything more about Binu. Binu has been subjected to interrogation. It was widely reported that Binu was with Harikumar for the last nine days as the police were hot on their trail. Therefore, the thinking is, he knows when Harikumar had returned to his house at Veyloor near Kallambalam.

Binu, it is felt, can also lead the CB sleuths to all the people who had helped them along the way. There were allegations that Harikumar had called up his "highly influential contacts" as he went on the run, top political leaders and police officers included.

Already, Binu's son Anoop Krishna and Satheesh Kumar, the owner of Akshaya Tourist home in Tamil Nadu's Thripparappu where Harikumar and Binu had stayed on the first day of their flight, have been arrested.

The CB is also tight-lipped about whether Binu was aware of Harikumar's plan to commit suicide. "Perhaps he might know why he committed suicide," an officer said on condition of anonymity. "We are also not sure whether Binu was with the DySP all along, they could have parted ways in between. We will have to talk to him before we come to any conclusion," the official said.

Binu is a crucial witness in the case. It was from Binu's house that Harikumar came out on the night of November 5 to find Sanalkumar's car parked right in front of his. It was the argument that followed that led to the death of Sanalkumar. Harikumar was a regular visitor to Binu's house. Harikumar, when he was CI of Fort Station in Thiruvananthapuram, had also inaugurated Binu's jewellery showroom at Kodangavila, which he had run in partnership with a friend named Ayyappan. Later, after Harikumar was posted as DySP Neyyatinkara, Ayyappan had died in mysterious circumstances. The police had concluded that it was suicide, death by consuming cyanide. There were charges that Harikumar had bailed out his friend.