Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) working president K T Rama Rao
Credit: PTI Photo
Hyderabad: The SIT probing the alleged phone tapping during the previous BRS regime has issued a notice to the party's working president K T Rama Rao to appear before it here on January 23 for examination.
Senior BRS leader and MLA T Harish Rao, on January 20, was questioned by the SIT in the case for almost seven hours.
Former Telangana intelligence chief T Prabhakar Rao, the prime accused in the case was earlier questioned by the SIT.
Responding to the notice, KTR on Thursday alleged that the ongoing phone-tapping investigation was nothing but a diversionary tactic meant to shield administrative failures and protect Chief Minister Revanth Reddy’s position.
KTR claimed that the Special Investigation Team (SIT) constituted by the government resembled a “daily television serial” rather than a genuine inquiry. He asserted that notices were being issued selectively to opposition leaders purely for political mileage while senior police and intelligence officials who actually oversaw the system in the past were being kept away from questioning.
According to KTR, every government in the country relies on intelligence agencies for maintaining law and order and safeguarding stability. He argued that surveillance mechanisms have existed since the time of Jawaharlal Nehru and continue even today under Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Such systems, he maintained, function within the police and intelligence establishment and do not operate at the discretion of ministers or political executives.
He questioned why former intelligence chiefs and police directors including current DGP Shivadhar Reddy, former DGP Mahender Reddy, ex-DGP and Home Secretary Jitender, and Ravi Gupta were not being summoned by the SIT. “If the probe is honest, these officers should be questioned first. Instead, political leaders are being targeted and an endless story is being spun for time pass,” he said.
He further accused the Chief Minister of using the controversy to buy time while travelling abroad, including visits to Davos and Harvard, claiming that instructions had been issued to keep the matter alive by sending notices to different BRS leaders on different days. Calling the case “baseless” and “trash,” KTR said even the investigating police officers were aware that nothing substantial existed.
The BRS leader claimed that notices to Harish Rao were issued within hours of the latter raising allegations about irregularities in coal contracts at Singareni involving relatives of the Chief Minister.
A suspended DSP of Telangana Special Intelligence Bureau (SIB) was among four police officials who have been arrested by Hyderabad Police since March 2024 for allegedly erasing the intelligence information from various electronic gadgets as well as for alleged phone-tapping during the previous BRS regime. They were subsequently granted bail.