MLA poaching case: Telangana court dismisses plea seeking remand of accused

Hyderabad: A city court here on Thursday declined to send three persons arrested for allegedly trying to buy four MLAs of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) into judicial custody.

The ACB Court judge, citing lack of evidence, dismissed the petition in which the police sought judicial remand of the accused. The court also made it clear that this can’t be treated as a case of corruption.

The court asked the police to question the accused by serving notices under section 41 of Criminal Procedure Code.

The police produced Ramachandra Bharati alias Satish Sharma, Nanda Kumar and Simhayaji Swamy before the judge at his residence in Saroornagar late on Thursday.

The accused, alleged to be BJP agents, were arrested from a farmhouse near Hyderabad on Wednesday night while they were trying to lure four MLAs of the TRS with offers of huge sums of cash, important positions and contracts.

On a complaint by one of the MLAs – Pilot Rohit Reddy, police registered an FIR against Ramachandra Bharati of Delhi, Nanda Kumar of Hyderabad and Simhayaji Swamy of Tirupati.

The case was registered under the Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 120 B (criminal conspiracy), 171-B (bribery) read with 171-E (punishment of bribery), 506 (punishment for criminal intimidation) read with 34 (acts done by several persons in furtherance of common intention) and section 8 of Prevention of Corruption Act.

According to the complainant, the accused offered him an amount of Rs 100 crore. They also offered to give central government civil contract works and higher central government positions for monetary benefits and lured him to join the BJP.

The MLA told the police that they warned that if he does not join the BJP, there will be criminal cases and raids by ED and CBI, and the Telangana government led by TRS will be toppled by them.

The accused allegedly offered bribes of Rs 50 crore each to three other MLAs to join the BJP.

On a tip-off by Rohit Reddy, Cyberabad police reached the farmhouse and arrested the three accused.

The trio were questioned by the police at an undisclosed location throughout Thursday.