Telangana: 'Is Rs 49 crore bank transfer a scam?' asks BRS leader Rama Rao on Formula E race case

Hyderabad: BRS leader K T Rama Rao attacked the Telangana government on Wednesday, seeking to know whether the dispensation wanted to project a Rs 49 crore bank-to-bank fund transfer, used to put Hyderabad on the World Formula E racing map, as a "scam".

Telangana's Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) recently filed a charge sheet in a court here in the Formula E race case in which Rama Rao is the prime accused.

Apart from Rama Rao, the charge sheet was filed against senior IAS officer Arvind Kumar, former Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority (HMDA) chief engineer B L N Reddy and two others.

In a post on X, Rama Rao, also known as KTR, said after two years and four months in power and two years of access to all documents and government machinery, the administration could only register a case related to Formula E race, where funds were merely transferred from one bank to another.

"You want to project a Rs 49 crore bank-to-bank fund transfer that was used to put Hyderabad on the World Formula E racing as a "scam"? Dear utterly desperate Scamgress, bring it on!" he said.

This ACB charge sheet not just symbolises a clear desperation from the Revanth Reddy government but also a certificate of spotless governance, he said sarcastically.

The charge sheet demonstrates that there wasn't a single violation during the BRS, which ran a government that focused on development and nothing but development, he added.

The Formula-E race was held in Hyderabad in February 2023. Although the second edition of the race was initially planned for 2024, it was cancelled after the Congress government assumed office in December 2023.

The probe against Rama Rao pertains to alleged irregularities in payments amounting to about Rs 55 crore, most of which were in foreign currency, in "violation of laid-down procedures" during the previous BRS regime, for the event planned for 2024.

In December 2024, the ACB registered a case against Rama Rao, Kumar, and Reddy.

The FIR was filed under relevant sections of the Prevention of Corruption Act and the IPC, dealing with criminal misappropriation, criminal misconduct, criminal breach of trust, and criminal conspiracy.