Court theft: Andhra government open to CBI probe

VIJAYAWADA: The Andhra Pradesh government on Tuesday informed the High Court its willingness to hand over the probe related to a theft, reportedly of evidence pertaining to a case involving Agriculture Minister Kakani Goverdhan Reddy, to the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI).Following the government’s submission, the court asked it to file an affidavit, and posted the matter for further hearing to May 6.

Police earlier said two habitual offenders had stolen the evidence saved in storage devices from the trial court on April 13. Nellore police later arrested the duo with the help of CCTV footage.Principal District Judge C Yamini also submitted a report to the High Court on the theft at the court. After going through the report, the High Court had earlier took suo motu cognisance of the issue and converted it into a Public Interest Litigation (PIL).

The case came up for hearing before the bench of Chief Justice Prashanth Kumar Mishra and Justice M Satyanarayana Murthy. When Advocate General S Sriram, on behalf of the Director General of Police, started to explain the progress in the case, investigation, the bench asked him to file a detailed affidavit.
Mentioning the communications and the report submitted by Judge Yamini to the High Court, the bench said the police investigation into the case was not in a proper manner and observed that the Judge’s report had opined that only an investigation by an independent agency would bring out the truth.

The bench issued notices to the Chief Secretary, the DGP, Principal Secretary (Home), CBI, Kakani Goverdhan Reddy and others to explain why the Nellore court theft case, as well as the case filed by former minister and TDP leader Somireddy Chandramohan Reddy against the minister, should not be handed over to the CBI.Responding, Advocate General Sriram informed the government’s willingness to hand over the probe to the CBI.

It may be recalled that in December 2017, Kakani, who was then in the Opposition, alleged that the then minister in N Chandrababu Naidu’s cabinet, Somireddy Chandramohan Reddy, had amassed a huge wealth and invested it in other countries, including Singapore. Kakani produced some documents related to Chandramohan Reddy’s alleged illegal wealth at a press conference.Chandramohan Reddy then filed a criminal case as well as a defamation case against Kakani. The evidences related to the case were stolen from the Nellore court this month, leading to criticism that Kakani was behind the incident.