Hyderabad: Andhra Pradesh Chief Minister Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy is said to have taken the call on arresting his political rival and Telugu Desam supremo N. Chandrababu Naidu after the Centre apparently developed cold feet on taking action against the Opposition leader in the ongoing investigations into alleged embezzlement of public money by the previous administration.
Both the AP Skill Development Corporation (APSDC) scam, in which Naidu was arrested, and the infrastructure kickbacks scam case in which the income-tax (I-T) department served notices on him were fit for trial under the Prevention of Corruption Act (PCA) and the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), sources said.
The evidence produced by the investigating agencies had established beyond doubt the role of Naidu along with others in the acts of omission and commission, sources said. The I-T department had even served a showcase asking Naidu why the kickbacks shouldn’t be treated as his undisclosed income.
Sources close to Jagan Mohan Reddy told this correspondent that the Chief Minister did not pause to consider the political ramifications of the arrest and any consequent impact on his electoral fortunes. “He wanted to place hard facts of the case before the people and call the bluff on Naidu’s claims of clean governance,” sources pointed out.
Jagan Mohan Reddy is said to have made repeated pleas to the Centre during his one-on-one meetings with the top brass to trace the ultimate beneficiaries in the scams and arrest them, but didn’t get a positive response. Incidentally, the APSDC scam was unearthed by the GST teams outside AP, and the ED took the cue and arrested the four kingpins in March this year.
“We have evidence that hawala money was routed to Naidu and his close aides. One of the main accused had close business links with a former Union minister,” sources said, adding that some of the players in the APSDC scam were involved in routing money through hawala in the infra kickbacks scam case.
Sources said that besides ignoring the Chief Minister’s requests, the BJP central leadership started sending indications that it was maintaining an equi-distant stand between the rival parties and, for the first time in four years, granted audience to Naidu. This led to Jagan Mohan Reddy feeling let down, his confidant told Deccan Chronicle.
The APSDC scam has all ingredients of the VW — Vashishta Wahan instead of Volkswagen — scam took place in YSR regime but the gravity is manifold; the amount that went out of the state exchequer in the present scam was more than Rs 300 crore against Rs 11 crore in the VW scam which was recovered within no time. The earlier scam had misused the name of Volkswagen while in the present case was another Germany-based MNC, Siemens. In both cases, the Indian heads of respective companies indulged in corruption by misguiding their headquarters. In the APSDC scam the public money siphoned off reached the then ruling party leaders as per documentary evidence.
The Telugu Desam hs cried foul over what it described as a psychotic reaction from the Chief Minister whose aim they claimed was to attach the ‘A1 (Accused No. 1)’ tag to Naidu at least once.
The party organised protests, though in a contained manner, and several of its leaders were arrested. Besides Pawan Kalyan of Jana Sena, TD got solid support from the state BJP with its leaders including party chief and Naidu’s sister-in-law Purandeswari. Others who joined the chorus include C.M. Ramesh, once a TD MP, and national secretary Satya Kumar, who once was a personal assistant to former vice-president M. Venkaiah Naidu.
The TD was confident that the people would not accept Naidu’s arrest and whoever remained neutral or undecided would move towards the party. Interestingly, Naidu’s wife Bhuvaneswari who rushed to Vijayawada and visited the Kanaka Durga temple raised the slogan of Amaravati while condemning Naidu’s arrest. His other family members appealed to voters to dethrone Jagan Mohan Reddy.
Apparently to stoke emotions, the TD men also accused Jagan Mohan Reddy of foul play by timing the arrest with the G20 Summit. The TD leaders in TV debates repeatedly pointed out that the Telugu people were denied an opportunity to witnesses Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s power and popularity among the top nations.
