DYFI State Secretary V K Sanoj Slams Media Over Fake News on Mundakkai-Chooralmala Township

Thiruvananthapuram: DYFI state secretary V K Sanoj has launched a sharp attack on certain Malayalam media outlets for deliberate misinformation about the Wayanad township being constructed by the state government in Kalpetta for the rehabilitation of survivors of the Mundakkai-Chooralmala landslide disaster.

In a Facebook post, Sanoj accused outlets he termed "right-wing's pet media" of fabricating stories about the government-built township while being unwilling to question the Congress leadership over the misappropriation of money collected in the name of Wayanad disaster victims.

The controversy centres on a recent report in which media outlets claimed to have found cracks in the ceiling of the newly constructed township. Revenue Minister K Rajan personally visited the site and wiped off the markings with sandpaper to demonstrate that what had been photographed were marker lines drawn by engineers not structural cracks. Sanoj said the fact that the minister had to intervene personally to debunk the story exposed the dangerous post-truth environment that certain Malayalam media had created.

"Even after that, some outlets ran the story as 'Minister visits to inspect cracks' — what do you call people like that?" Sanoj wrote.

Turning to the Congress, Sanoj demanded to know what had been done with the money raised in the name of Wayanad's disaster victims. He asked whether funds spent on a luxury resort stay in Munnar by KPCC president V D Satheeshan after the elections were drawn from the Wayanad relief collection, and whether media outlets that promoted the fake crack story would have the courage to ask Satheeshan that question. He also referenced reports of funds being transferred to accounts abroad, and asked what the Congress's response to those allegations was.

"Those who have taken their share of money wrung from the tears of disaster victims can only point to a marker line and scream 'crack,'" Sanoj wrote.

The DYFI leader also praised the Keralam government's rehabilitation model, saying few governments anywhere in the world had embraced disaster survivors the way Keralam had, and that by constructing a full township for those who lost everything in the landslide, the state had set a new global example in disaster recovery.