Hyderabad: Telangana Pradesh Congress Committee (TPCC) senior vice-president Niranjan Reddy wrote to Telangana Director General of Police Ravi Gupta (DGP) alleging that senior policemen and bureaucrats misused their powers to phone-tap and snoop on chief minister Revanth Reddy when he was the opposition leader earlier.
In his letter, Niranjan Reddy alleged that SIB officials hired a house near Revanth Reddy’s house and reportedly hired a device brought from Israel to record his conversations. He questioned the necessity for having used such a device. “Moreover, it is known that it was brought without the permission of the concerned Union Home Ministry,”.
The TPCC senior vice-president also named IAS officers Somesh Kumar, Arvind Kumar and ex-Special Intelligence Bureau (SIB) chief T Prabhakar Rao, who held senior positions under the previous Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) government when K Chandrashekar Rao (KCR) was chief minister. Revanth Reddy and other opposition leaders were reportedly snooped upon and had their calls tapped by the previous government.
Somesh Kumar is a former chief secretary of Telangana under the previous BRS government, and was later brought in as an advisor after he retired. Arvind Kumar holds the rank of special chief secretary, and was majorly in-charge of urban development projects in and around Hyderabad. Niranjan Reddy has alleged that they were also involved in the case pertaining to Revanth Reddy’s calls being tapped.
”If this device is required for surveillance of Naxalites, then why is it installed in Hyderabad city near the residence of Shri A Revanth Reddy? It is also published in the newspapers that these SIB officers targeted the businessmen in real estate to extort the money. Are these people being policemen? Or thugs/pirates?,” questioned Niranjana Reddy in his letter.
Adding that he is not blaming the entire police force, the TPCC leader asked the DGP to see that the entire administration is “clean” and asked for a strict warning to be given to officers of all departments.
In a case booked by the Hyderabad police on the issue, so far DSP Praneeth Rao and two other Additional Commissioners of Polcie (ACP) have been arrested. Moreover, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) state executive member Saran Chowdary on Tuesday also filed a complaint against former deputy commissioner of police P Radhakrishna and two other cops for alleged intimidation and harassment in collection with the Revanth Reddy phone-tapping case.
