Hyderabad: The initial chargesheet in the cash-for-vote scam filed on July 28 had named four persons including Telugu Desam legislator A. Revanth Reddy, now working president of the Telangana Telugu Desam unit.
A top official of the Forensic Science Laboratory told this newspaper: “All the evidence pertaining to the cash-for-vote scam has been sent to the ACB court after giving final reports. They were obtained by the agency from the court. We have sent reports in batches.”
Interestingly the ACB has failed to trace the source of the money in the case. “It is difficult to trace the source of the money as was paid in cash,? an investigating official said. ?The cash has been seized in the presence of prime accused Revanth Reddy so that itself is strong evidence.”
The ACB has recorded the statements of 39 witnesses to file a 316-page chargesheet initially. The preliminary chargesheet was filed against Mr Revanth Reddy, Bishop Harry Sebastian, Revanth Reddy’s aide Uday Simha and Jerusalem Mattaiah under the Prevention of Corruption Act and for criminal conspiracy.
Though the ACB had mentioned the name of AP Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu 22 times, to indicate that the other accused acted on his behest to bribe Anglo Indian nominated MLA Elvis Stephenson, the agency failed to gather more evidence against him other than the forensic report confirming the audio conversation between Mr Stephenson and Mr Naidu.
