In Telangana, BJP National Secretary BL Santhosh was named as an accused in the alleged horse-trading of MLAs. Now the number of accused in the case has gone up to seven. In an earlier hearing, the court had directed the police not to arrest the senior BJP leader as he was not named as an accused, but it remains to be seen how things progress now.
BJP spokesperson Krishna Sagar Rao said the party has no comment on the development at present. Meanwhile, Santosh was also served a second notice on Wednesday to appear for questioning by the Special Investigation Team constituted in the case.
The Telangana High Court allowed the SIT to issue a fresh notice under Section 41A of the Code of Criminal Procedure after Santhosh did not appear after the first notice. Justice B Vijaysen Reddy asked the SIT to serve the notice through email or WhatsApp.
The BJP leader has been asked to appear for questioning on November 26. He did not appear as directed on November 21 citing busy schedule due to elections. Besides him, notices were also served to two others – Hyderabad-based lawyer Pratap Goud and Chitralekha, wife of the main accused.
At a recent state executive meeting, Telangana BJP chief Bandi Sanjay Kumar said that his party would not spare the Telangana Rashtra Samithi for “harassing” Santhosh. He said the BJP leader was selfless publicist working for the country.
“Who are these people who are taking the name of Santosh in these videos? They have nothing to do with BJP. KCR is scared because his party leaders are under investigation on corruption charges. He is trying to malign the image of BJP.
Earlier, notices were served to four persons – Santhosh, Dr Jaggu Swamy, Thushar Vellapalli (president of Bharat Dharma Jana Sena) and A Srinivas (a lawyer known to be a distant relative of the Telangana BJP chief). So far only Srinivas has appeared before the SIT.
Three men – Ramchandra Bharti alias Satish Sharma, Simhayaji and Nand Kumar – were arrested by the Cyberabad police from a farmhouse in Moinabad in October after they allegedly tried to get four TRS leaders to join the BJP . The arrest took place after a raid based on a tip-off from TRS leader Pilot Rohit Reddy. He alleged that he was offered Rs 100 crore to join the saffron party, while three others were promised Rs 50 crore each.
After the arrest, purported audio recordings of conversations between the main accused started going viral on the internet. The three main accused can be heard talking to Rohit Reddy and talking about the number of MLAs they want. Santosh’s name figures prominently in the conversation. He is reportedly the man of the deal, the men are heard saying in conversation.
SC asks Telangana HC to reconsider plea for CBI probe
In a related development, the Supreme Court on November 15 set aside the directions passed by the Telangana High Court, which had allowed the SIT to probe the alleged poaching case. Responding to a petition filed by the three main accused in the case, the SC asked the HC to reconsider the plea filed by them to transfer the case to the CBI.
The High Court had asked the SIT not to report to any political or executive agency. It had also asked the team to submit its report in a sealed cover to prevent it from leaking to the media. However, the SC bench did not find certain directions given by the HC to be sustainable in law.
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