Thiruvananthapuram: The Air India has suspended an official, L S Sibu, who had earlier filed a police complaint against gold smuggling case accused Swapna Suresh.
The action was taken against Sibu for talking to media about matters relating to Air India in violation of the conduct rules. He was emailed the suspension order on Wednesday afternoon.
Sibu was caught in a legal tussle after a fake sexual harassment complaint was filed against him by a gang, including Swapna, five years ago.
Sibu, a union leader, who was working as the ground officer at the Thiruvananthapuram airport then, had filed complaints to the Central government and Vigilance Commission over irregularities at the Air India SATS. Then the sexual harassment complaint against Sibu, signed by 16 women staff, was filed to the Thiruvananthapuram airport director in January 2015. Sibu was transferred to Hyderabad in March 2015. However, this complaint was later found to be fake.
Sibu then filed a complaint against Swapna Suresh and Air India SATS official Binoy Jacob for forging the fake complaint.
As he was not satisfied with the preliminary investigation by the police, Sibu approached the High Court. The Crime Branch then took up the probe as per the High Court's order. Sibu has been suspended now even as the Crime Branch completed the probe and was set to submit the charge-sheet in court.
The Crime Branch had found that Swapna had fabricated the harassment complaint. Two IPS officers had reportedly intervened to prevent Swapna from being questioned in this case.
After the gold smuggling scandal came to light, earlier complaints against Swapna Suresh also came under the scrutiny.
A multi-agency probe was initiated after the Customs seized 30kg gold from diplomatic baggage addressed to the UAE Consulate in Thiruvananthapuram last month. Swapna Suresh along with another accused Sandeep Nair was arrested from Bengaluru by the National Investigation Agency (NIA).
