The cash-for-vote scam has come back to haunt AP chief minister Chandrababu Naidu with the principal special judge for ACB cases on Monday ordering the anti-corruption branch (ACB) to thoroughly inves
The cash-for-vote scam has come back to haunt AP chief minister Chandrababu Naidu with the principal special judge for ACB cases on Monday ordering the anti-corruption branch (ACB) to thoroughly investigate a fresh complaint filed by YSR Congress legislator A. Ramakrishna Reddy.
He appended reports from forensic labs in Mumbai and London which he said had confirmed that the voice recorded in the conversations pertaining to the cash-for-vote scandal was that of Mr Naidu.
Based on this, the YSR Congress MLA sought the court to make Mr Naidu the key accused in the case and investigate his role as abettor and perpetrator.
The Telangana ACB on May 31, 2015, had arrested TD MLA A. Revanth Reddy and a few others in Hyderabad. They were accused of trying to bribe Anglo-Indian nominated MLA Elvis Stephenson '5 crore for the latter to vote for the TD candidate in the member of Legisla-tive Council elections.
The TS ACB had found audio and video conversation, including that of Mr Naidu, talking to the independent MLA, luring him to vote for the TD.
A voice purported to be that of Mr Naidu was he-ard saying, “Hello, good evening brother, how are you Manavallu briefed me...I am with you. This is our commitment... We will work together.”
Petitioner Ramakris-hna Reddy alleged, “It is clearly evident that Mr Naidu was party to the criminal conspiracy along with other accused and abetted defector complainant Elvis to vote in favour of their candidate. MLA Revanth Reddy was caught red-handed with Rs 50 lakh while handing it over to MLA Elvis Stephenson.”
Investigation should be done against Mr Naidu under the offences of Criminal Conspiracy and Prevention of Corruption Act.”
The test sample that was sent by Mr Ramakrishna Reddy was taken from Mr Naidu’s speech at Davos and compared with the audio recording. A forensic lab in Maharashtra had stated in its report according to the petitioner: “The auditory analysis of recorded questioned voice sample of speaker (Mr Naidu) and specimen voice sample of the speaker are similar.”
The ACB has to submit its report before September 29 regarding the case.
Petitioner’s advocate Ponnavolu Sudhakar Reddy said, “After considering the 29-page complaint, the judge directed the agency to investigate the case under Section 156 (3) of CrPC, which provides powers to the magistrate to check the police’s performance and monitor it besides placing the persons named in the complaint as accused in the case.”
The complainant also filed audio-visual recordings of Mr Naidu’s interview transcript with the anchor of a national news channel where he had said that his phone had been tapped.
