Telangana: Special Investigation Team grills Alladi Tanish to bust drug culture

Hyderabad: The Special Investigation Team on drug cases on Monday questioned Tollywood hero Alladi Tanish on the drug culture in the film industry and trafficking.

A source from the SIT said that Tanish was comfortable during the interrogation and replied to most of the questions with a ‘Yes’ or ‘No’.

Despite this, the source said the SIT had got “some useful information” from his statements. “He denied drug consumption and did not reveal any clues on his relationship with alleged mastermind Calvin Mascarenhas and Zeeshan Ali Khan. But we have got strong evidence against them after questioning Tanish,” the source said.

“As he was co-operative and as per the evidence we have that he is not a drug peddler, we finished his interrogation in four hours,” the source said.

The SIT questioned him on his mobile numbers, the reasons behind his foreign trips and his visits to pubs related to two heroes in Tollywood.

After completing the interrogation, Tanish told the media that he had never consumed drugs and was against narcotics. “My family faced trouble due to stories in the media on my ‘links’ with the drug racket. I co-operated with the SIT,” he said.

So far the SIT has questioned 11 film personalities — director Puri Jagannath, camera person Shyam K. Naidu, art director Chinna, actors Ravi Teja, Navdeep, Tarun, Subba Raju and actresses Charmme and Mumaith Khan — for more than 94 hours since July 19. Actor Ananda Krishna alias Nandu will be questioned on Tuesday.

The SIT questioned two engineering students, Nirupam Reddy and Akhil Chaudhary on Monday in connection with the drugs cases.

An official from the SIT said that after questioning Nandu, the SIT would verify al the video footage of statements given by the film personalities before taking a call on producing the evidence in court.