(MS Shanker)
The much-publicized poachgate case played up by the Bharat Rashtra Samiti (BRS) on the eve of the Munugodu assembly by-poll which the ruling party managed to win with a slender margin, saw another twist with the state High Court’s decision to transfer the case to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).The verdict seems to have cleared the dark clouds that were hovering over this controversial incident.
Although doubts were expressed the way the ruling party’s claims that there was a bigger controversy through their four MLAs poaching, it could not see through what is in store for them – that’s much more embarrassing – as it overlooked its own Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) itself expressing apprehensions over the way the poaching had happened. The ACB in its first look disproved the Cyberabad Police claims, by questioning “where is the so-called huge sum of money” at the ‘crime scene’?Yet, a determined BRS government headed by Kalvakuntla Chandrasekhar Rao went ahead at tearing-speed to appoint a Special Investigation Team (SIT) headed by the Hyderabad City Police Commissioner CV Anand and wanted to go ahead with its probe. The SIT had even sent a summons, not once but twice, to the most powerful and influential BJP leader and party general secretary BL Santosh, based on video and audio tapes, in which one of the alleged poachers dropped the name of the BJP leader.
Again, this move was turned down by the ACB stating that without any prima facie evidence, it cannot summon all and sundry in the case. And, the state High Court’s directive to transfer the alleged MLAs poaching case to the CBI brought more embarrassment to the government, though one of the party’s functionaries, Krishnak, describes it as a ‘great relief’ in a tweet. On Dec 26, the Telangana High Court transferred the probe to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI). Interestingly, the high court had also dissolved the state government-formed Special Investigation Team (SIT) which was probing the case.On October 26, three people were arrested from a farmhouse on the outskirts of Hyderabad, while allegedly luring the lawmakers into joining the BJP by offering huge money, posts, and contracts. Of the accused, Nanda Kumar is from Hyderabad, while Simhayaji Swamy is from Tirupati in the neighboring Andhra Pradesh.
The ruling party MLAs they tried to lure are Pilot Rohit Reddy, Guvvala Balaraju, B Harshavardhan Reddy, and Rega Kantha Rao.But, the BJP flatly denies any attempts to poach the legislators.On November 22, the police filed a memo in the ACB special court at Nampally criminal courts in Hyderabad, asking for permission to include BL Santhosh as accused No. 4 (A-4) in the poaching case.
it also wanted three others – founder-president of Bharat Dharmika Jana Sena of Kerala, Tushar Vellapally; a doctor with Amrutha Institute of Medical Sciences at Kerala’s Ernakulam, Dr. Kottilil Narayan Jaggu alias Jaggu Swamy; and senior advocate from Karimnagar B Srinivas — as A-5, A-6, and A-7, respectively.
And, the police argued in the ACB court that the Special Investigation Team (SIT) constituted by the Telangana government to probe the case, during its investigation, found that Santhosh and three others were in contact with the three accused named in the FIR for luring the four TRS MLAs – Pilot Rohit Reddy, Guvvala Balaraju, B Harshavardhan Reddy and Rega Kantha Rao — into the BJP.The ACB court agreed with the contention of the defense lawyers that there is no such procedure to include any suspect as an accused in the FIR through a memo unless there was a specific complaint against him with proper evidence. Hence, the court struck down the memo and refused to name Santhosh and three other suspects as accused in the case.
This forced the state government to move the High Court anticipating it would not heed the pleas of those accused who were seeking the case transfer to the CBI expressing apprehensions that they may not get justice as the state is misusing its police to prosecute them in an uncouth manner for political gains. In a clever move, the state government had also shown its brazenness to withdraw the general consent on October 30 to CBI, knowing well that all those accused in the poaching case may make such a demand.
The state government has withdrawn general consent earlier given to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in the state. The government issued an order on August 30 withdrawing general consent given to the Central Bureau of Investigation in the State. From now on prior consent will be required on a case to case basis for probes in any case. It’s fool-hardy on the part of the state government which should have known that the courts enjoy the right to reverse the decision.
