It’s a taxi driver who was piloting PM all the way

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM: Red-faced policemen in Kerala are now looking into the circumstances that led to the PM’s motorcade landing in a no-man’s land in the state capital on Tuesday night while being driven from the airport to Raj Bhavan. The apparent goof-up revealed that the security officials had in fact hired a tourist taxi driver called Shiju for the said journey. The driver was promptly taken into custody by the SPG team escorting the PM and is being interrogated.

The accompanying circle inspector of police, R Balachandran, has been suspended. State home minister Kodiyeri Balakrishnan had to return to the state following the unsavoury incident. He admitted that there had been a security lapse and attributed it to the “negligent attitude” of the officials concerned. Additional DGP Jacob Punnoose is probing the matter and a report has been sought within 48 hours.

While the PMO would seek an explanation for the PM being made to undergo such an unpleasant experience, what the Kerala police would have to explain is how a rank outsider as a tourist taxi driver could be engaged for piloting the PM’s vehicle.


Police officials say this has been the practice in the past and that the unforeseen mishap had led to the issue being blown out of proportion. The PM’s security officials must have found the entire episode particularly unnerving because it happened on October 31, the day former prime minister Indira Gandhi was assassinated, and only just a few hours before the dawn of November 1, the day when a Keralite, Akbar Raj, had threatened to kill Manmohan Singh in Kerala on his trip here.