Sasikala VVIP treatment: DIG Roopa’s former boss files defamation case against her

Bengaluru: Karnataka police D Roopa, who had reported on the alleged special VVIP perks being given to jailed AIADMK leader Sasikala in prison and was subsequently transferred, has been sued for defamation by her former boss.

Retired DGP HN Sathyanarayana Rao has filed a Rs 20 crore defamation case against DIG Roopa for “baseless allegations” against him, when he was the incharge of the prisons department.

Rao, who retired in August, has also included an English daily and a regional TV news channel in the defamation suit and has moved a city civil court regarding the same.

The court admitted the petition and fixed the next date of hearing as December 12.

Roopa, on July 13, had alleged that preferential treatment was being given to Sasikala in the prison, amid allegations of payment of Rs 2 crore to an official for it, prompting the Karnataka government to order a probe.

She had levelled the charges in a report to her superior, DGP (Prisons) H S Sathyanarayana Rao.

Chief Minister Siddaramaiah had announced a “high-level probe” into the allegations as the two senior officers engaged in a bitter public spat.

Both were subsequently shifted.

With PTI inputs