MLAs’ poaching case: SIT serves notices to two more persons

Hyderabad: The Special Investigation Team (SIT) of Telangana police probing the MLA’s poaching case has issued notices to two more persons.

Pratap Goud, a lawyer from Amberpet area of Hyderabad, and Chitralekha, wife of Nanda Kumar, one of the three accused in the case, have been served notices under section 41A of the Criminal Procedure Code.

The duo has been directed to appear before SIT for questioning at the Integrated Police Command and Control Centre on Wednesday.

With this, the SIT has issued notices to six persons in the case. Earlier, the notices were served on four persons but only one of them has appeared.

ABhusarapu Srinivas, a lawyer from Karimnagar, appeared before SIT on Monday and Tuesday.

Srinivas, who is said to be a relative of Telangana BJP president Bandi Sanjay Kumar, had allegedly funded the flight expenses for Simhayaji, one of the three accused arrested for the alleged attempt to buy four MLAs of ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS).

BJP general secretary B. L. Santosh, Bharath Dharma Jana Sena (BDJS) president Tushar Vellapally and a doctor from Kerala, Jaggu Swamy are yet to appear before SIT.

The SIT has issued lookout notices for Tushar, an ally of BJP in Kerala and Jaggu Swamy as the probe team failed to locate their whereabouts. Circulars were also issued to prevent them from leaving the country.

Dr Kottilil Narayan Jaggu, alias Jaggu Swamy, a doctor at Amrita Institute of Medical Sciences at Ernakulam in Kerala, is alleged to have played a key role to lure the TRS MLAs to defect to BJP by offering huge sums of money.

The SIT on Tuesday informed the Telangana High Court that he is not cooperating in the investigation. Justice B. Vijayasen Reddy sought to know from BJP’s counsel as to why Santosh did not appear before the SIT officials.

The SIT informed the court that Santosh was served notice through Delhi police but he did not appear before it. The court was told that the top BJP functionary is not cooperating in the investigation.

Telangana High Court had on November 19 turned down the request of BJP state unit to stay the notice issued to Santosh.

Justice Viajaysen Reddy, however, made it clear that Santosh should not be arrested since the SIT had already issued notice to him under Section 41A of Criminal Procedure Code. The judge observed that Santosh should not apprehend his arrest and asked him to comply with the conditions imposed in the SIT notice.

Santosh’s name figured in the conversation between three alleged BJP agents arrested by the police last month while trying to lure four MLAs of TRS to the BJP fold with an offer of huge money.

Ramachandra Bharati alias Satish Sharma, Simhayaji and Nanda Kumar were arrested by the Cyberabad police from a farmhouse at Moinabad near Hyderabad on the night of October 26 when they were allegedly trying to lure four MLAs of TRS with offers of huge money.

Cyberabad police conducted the raid on a tip-off by Pilot Rohit Reddy, one of the MLAs. He alleged that the accused offered Rs 100 crore to him and Rs 50 crore each to three others.

The accused were booked under various sections of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) and Prevention of Corruption Act.