After Moinabad expose, firing and firefighting in Telangana

The political fallout of what was meant to be BJP's clandestine operation saw both the TRS and the saffron party trading charges and counter charges

Hyderabad: Telangana is in the eye of a political storm after Wednesday’s busting of the Bharatiya Janata Party’s covert operation to buy four MLAs of the Telangana Rashtra Samithi (now Bharat Rashtra Samithi), with the atmosphere all set to gather more heat with just five days left for campaigning ahead of the November 3 by-poll in Munugode.

The three persons, arrested by the Cyberabad Police while acting as agents for the BJP, were on Thursday questioned further and later produced before court. The police have booked cases against the three under IPC Sections 120-B (criminal conspiracy), 171-B (attempt to induce with bribe), 171-E (bribe), 506 (criminal intimidation) read with 34 (criminal act by several persons) and Section 8 of the Prevention of Corruption Act.

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In the complaint filed before the police, Tandur MLA Pilot Rohit Reddy said Ramachandra Bharati and Nanda Kumar contacted him a month ago and offered him Rs.100 crore apart from Central government contracts. He was asked to get the other three to join him for which they would be given Rs.50 crore each. The legislators were also threatened with ED and CBI raids if they did not join BJP, he said.

As the police intensified the investigation, the political fallout of what was meant to be BJP’s clandestine operation saw both the TRS and the saffron party trading charges and counter charges, with the BJP also moving the High Court for a CBI probe into the incident.

On the other hand, TRS supporters burnt effigies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Home Minister Amit Shah and the BJP across the State, with almost every TRS Minister and MLA taking turns to slam the BJP for its attempted underhand deal.

There was condemnation of the operation from across the nation as well, with political analysts, veteran journalists and politicians, right from Vineet Narain to Yogendra Yadav to Prashanth Bhushan and HD Kumaraswamy and several others, pointing out that the BJP was making a mockery of democracy.

The BJP, finding itself cornered with its back against the wall, deployed all its top leaders in the State, from union Minister G Kishan Reddy, State president Bandi Sanjay Kumar to Rajya Sabha MP K Laxman and Nizamabad MP D Aravind, to face the media.

The desperate fire fighting saw attempts to push the ball into the TRS court by throwing accusations at Chief Minister K Chandrashekhar Rao, demands for a court-monitored probe by a Special Investigation Team, a probe by the CBI and also by sitting judges.

Rattled by the expose, the party is also reportedly fighting to hush up internal differences over the incident, with Kishan Reddy and Bandi Sanjay Kumar apparently engaged in a mutual blame game. Kishan Reddy appeared flustered in a press conference, his second one since the news broke out, and struggled to maintain a straight face when repeatedly asked about his connections with the one of the arrested persons.

In the poll-bound Munugode meanwhile, the Moinabad farmhouse incident dominated electioneering, particularly for the TRS and Congress, while the tremors ostensibly upset the campaign of BJP candidate Komatireddy Rajgopal Reddy.

According to reports, he curtailed his campaign citing a fever after speaking for barely 20 minutes at Choutuppal and for less than 10 minutes at Gudrapally and Angadipet.