Hyderabad: City police commissioner CV Anand on Monday issued orders to dismiss from service rape-accused inspector Korasala Nageswara Rao, who was booked for sexually assaulting a woman. Anand said that Rao’s actions reflected “unbridled misuse of authority”, and was also a “severe criminal breach of trust” with regard to his job of upholding the law.
Nageswara Rao has been accused of allegedly raping and attempting to kill a woman after trespassing into her house at Vanasthalipuram. The victim, aged around 30 years, lodged a complaint with the Vanasthalipuram police under the Rachakonda commissionerate.
Nageswara Rao was posted in different positions under the Hyderabad police. In the first week of April, while working as inspector, Task Force North Zone, he raided a pub at Radisson Blu hotel in Banjara Hills where cocaine was reportedly found. The high-profile case was widely reported as children of a few affluent businessmen and Tollywood personalities were caught.
After the case, Nageswara Rao got the Banjara Hills SHO posting – a much sought-after post in Hyderabad. In April third week, the police inspector was in the news again when he booked a case against 69 people, including prime accused T. G. Vishwaprasad.
Vishwaprasad is the nephew of TG Venkatesh, former state minister and Bharatiya Janata Party Rajya Sabha member from neighbouring Andhra Pradesh. He was booked for allegedly attempting to grab a prime property adjacent to the Andhra Pradesh Gems and Jewellery Park, in the upmarket Banjara Hills.
Rao, who was earlier suspended from service after he faced criminal charges, also is believed to have illegally tracked the mobile of the victim’s husband to find out where he was going. Nageswara Rao reportedly used that to find where they were and landed in their house at Vanasthalipuram, where he allegedly raped the woman.
In a press release issued on Monday, Hyderabad police commissioner CV Anand said, “He (inspector Nageswara Rao) has a criminal bent of mind which is amply proved and he can go to any extent to threaten, influence and intimidate the victims and witnesses. Moreover, the regular department enquiry may take a long time during which there is likely to be an interaction between him and the victims and witnesses which can be intimidating to them.”
The Hyderabad police commissioner stated that in this particular case it was not “reasonably practicable” to conduct a regular departmental enquiry as per regular provisions, due to the possibility of inspector Nageswara Rao being able to influence or intimidate the victim. Hence, after taking all the facts into consideration, Anand chose to award the ‘dismissal of service’ punishment to the suspended inspector.
Between December 25, 2021, and October 7, 2022, the Hyderabad police punished 55 officials from the department, with ‘dismissal of service’, ‘removal of from service, ‘compulsory retirement’, and ‘termination of probation’, according to data from the release.
