In a dramatic development, the police in Hyderabad on Wednesday claimed to have caught three persons while they were trying to ‘buy’ four MLAs of Telangana’s ruling TRS party.
The four were detained during a raid at a farm house at Aziz Nagar on the city outskirts while offering money to four MLAs.
Cyberabad police conducted the raids on a tip-off by the legislators. One of those detained is from Delhi while two others were from Tirupati and Hyderabad.
The police reportedly seized Rs 15 crore so far. Cyberabad Police Commissioner Stephen Ravindra said the deal could be to the tune of Rs 100 crore.
Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) MLAs Rega Kantha Rao, Guvvala Balaraju, Beeram Harshvardhan Reddy and Pilot Rohit Reddy had alerted police that attempts were being made to lure them to switch loyalties.
The Commissioner said the MLAs alleged that some BJP leaders were trying to lure them to defect from the TRS by offering prominent posts, contracts and huge cash.
Those detained are Ramachandra Bharati a.k.a S. Satish Sharma from Delhi and Simhayajulu from Tirupati, both said to be temple priests and Nanda Kumar, a businessman from Hyderabad said to be close to a union minister.
Police officials said further investigations were on in the case.
The TRS has alleged that the BJP is trying to lure its MLAs to defect. It said those detained by the police were close to BJP leaders.
TRS leader Krishank Manne posted on his Twitter account photographs of the accused with union ministers Rajnath Singh, G. Kishan Reddy and Uttar Pradesh Chief Minister Yogi Adityanath.
“This is a conspiracy against KCR ji’s Government by BJP’s big leaders,” he tweeted.
Another TRS leader termed the accused three agents of union home minister Amit Shah.
TRS MLA Balka Suman alleged that the BJP was resorting to cheap tactics due to fear of defeat in the Munugode Assembly by-election. He claimed that the TRS MLAs foiled the conspiracy of BJP.
“The BJP leaders should know that the TRS MLAs and Telangana people are not for sale,” he said.
However, BJP leaders denied the allegations. Party national vice-president D. K. Aruna said that those named by the police were not BJP leaders. She alleged that Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao was doing a new drama for political mileage. She said people would not believe KCR’s story.
