Kannur: A former Assistant Commissioner of Police who served on the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the death of Additional District Magistrate Naveen Babu is now a CPM candidate in Kannur’s Sreekandapuram Municipality.

In the 44-member Sreekandapuram municipal council, the LDF has 33 councillors. T K Ratnakumar, who retired from service in March 2025, is contesting from the Kottur division, a CPM stronghold.

As ACP, he had supervisory charge of the SIT that investigated the case after CPM leader P P Divya was booked for abetting the suicide of ADM Naveen Babu.

Divya, then Kannur District Panchayat president and a district committee member of the CPM, was arrested on October 29. The party later removed her from the party district committee. She also stepped down from the panchayat president post. She spent 10 days in jail before securing bail on November 8, 2024.

On October 14, 2024, during a farewell hosted for Naveen Babu at the Kannur Collectorate, Divya gatecrashed the event, accused him of delaying a no-objection certificate for a fuel station, said she had “more to say in two days,” and walked out. The remark was widely reported and interpreted as an allegation that the ADM had delayed the NOC for a bribe.

Babu was to join as ADM in Pathanamthitta the next morning and finish his last seven months of service in his home district. Instead, he was found dead in his Kannur quarters, in the same clothes he wore at the farewell.

His family repeatedly accused the investigation team of shielding Divya. His wife, Manjusha, approached the court, listing 13 lapses in the probe. Naveen Babu’s brother, Praveen Babu, had named Divya in his complaint to the police.

The Congress now alleges that Ratnakumar’s candidature is a “reward for services rendered” to the CPM. The retired officer has dismissed the charge, saying he came from a CPM family and simply returned to the party after retirement.

To be sure, the chargesheet concluded that Divya’s speech at the farewell was the immediate trigger for the suicide, though Naveen Babu left no note behind.

Another controversial candidature
In Payyannur Municipality, the CPM has fielded former area secretary K P Madhu, who previously faced organisational action for sharing obscene images in a party WhatsApp group. In August 2020, he was removed from the area secretary post after circulating intimate photos in a group that included women members.