YS Vivekananda Reddy murder: YS Avinash Reddy seeks pre-arrest bail, gets 1-day Telangana HC relief

HYDERABAD: YSRCP MP from Kadapa, YS Avinash Reddy, on Monday got a 24-hour stay on his arrest and interrogation from Telangana high court for his alleged role in the murder of former AP minister YS Vivekananda Reddy.
The court directive to CBI followed an inconclusive hearing on arguments on the anticipatory bail petition by Avinash Reddy even as the CBI counsel told the court the Kadapa MP may be arrested after questioning on Tuesday. The order is likely to be pronounced on Tuesday.
The MP was slapped with a notice on Sunday to appear in the CBI office in Hyderabad for questioning, on a day his father, YS Bhaskar Reddy, was arrested in a pre-dawn swoop on his native village in Kadapa and sent to a prison in Hyderabad.
Avinash Reddy was scheduled to depose before the CBI and face questions on his alleged attempt to destroy evidence from the crime scene on the morning of March 15, 2019, the day Vivekananda Reddy was murdered. However, his advocates sought time, citing the hearing on his anticipatory bail plea in high court.
His counsel, T Niranjan Reddy, argued that the probe agency had summoned them as witnesses, but was resorting to sudden arrests by overnight converting their status to accused. "CBI, ironically, is doing all this based on a statement by Shaik Dastagiri, a hired assassin, who later turned approver. CBI is believing his false theories," he said, objecting to the way Bhaskar Reddy was arrested and sent to jail in the same case. Now, they are hounding the MP, who has got nothing to do with the case, said Niranjan.
CBI counsel refuted this argument and said it's incorrect to say they are relying solely on Dastagiri's statement.
We have other evidence too. There is no bar on arresting people, who were called as witnesses, but would eventually emerge as accused with new evidence surfacing," he said.
Justice K Surender also allowed a petition by Dr N Sunitha, who urged the court to allow her to implead in the case as a relevant party. She wants to oppose any relief for those who conspired to kill her father.
On Monday, CBI court too heard and reserved its orders for Tuesday on CBI's plea for 10-day custody of Bhaskar Reddy, and his associate Uday Kumar Reddy, who have already been arrested in the case.