Senior IPS officer, A B Venkateswara Rao, who is under suspension, wrote a fresh letter to the state government seeking permission to file defamation case against MLA Chevireddy Bhaskara Reddy and others. The IPS office had directed his letter to the General Administration Department secretary with a copy to the chief secretary.

The IPS officer said that the MLA and chief public relations officer in the chief minister’s office Pudi Srihari. He said that these persons have made baseless allegations against him causing damage to his image.

He further said that he would also file the defamation case against the Sakshi media group, including its editor Vardhelli Murali. He alleged that Srihari had released a six-page powerpoint presentation to the media making false and baseless allegations against him.

These allegations were duly reported by the Sakshi media, both the Sakshi paper and the Sakshi TV, he said in the letter. However, none of those allegations were mentioned in the charge memo issued to him by the state government.

He said that the allegations levelled against him by Srihari caused mental agony to him, his family members and friends. He sought the government’s permission to proceed against Srihari, MLA Bhaskara Reddy and the Sakshi media group.

Interestingly, A B Venkateswara Rao had made these allegations last week, when he addressed a media conference denying the charges of TDP government purchasing Pegasus spyware. Venkateswara Rao was the Intelligence wing chief during the TDP government.