Former BRS MP Joginpally Santosh Kumar grilled by SIT in phone tapping case

Former BRS MP Joginpally Santosh Kumar on Tuesday appeared before the Special Investigation Team (SIT) in connection with the phone tapping case. He was the third BRS leader to appear before SIT after BRS working president KT Rama Rao and senior party leader T Harish Rao.

J Santosh Kumar, who is considered a close aide of the former chief minister K Chandrasekhar Rao, was targeted by the latter’s daughter for isolating the BRS chief from the people. He appeared before the SIT at the office of the Assistant Commissioner of Police in Jubilee Hills at 3 pm in response to a notice from it under Section 160 of the CrPC. Before the visit to the SIT, the BRS MP visited K Chandrasekhar Rao at his residence in Banjara Hills.

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Both KT Rama Rao and T Harish Rao had been grilled by the SIT for nearly seven hours. The main accused in the case is Prabhakhar Rao, the former Special Intelligence Bureau chief accused of tapping BRS opponents, party leaders and even family members like Kalvakuntla Kavitha and her husband under the garb of surveillance for Naxalism. The BRS, however, has dismissed the case as a ploy to distract people’s attention from the misgovernance of the Congress government in Telangana.

Telangana Jagruthi leader and KCR’s daughter, Kalvakuntla Kavitha, said Santosh was one of the demons surrounding her father. Blaming Santosh Rao for all the problems plaguing the BRS, Kavitha said, “If people like Gaddar were left waiting (outside Pragathi Bhavan’s gates) and Etela Rajender came out of the party, the centre point of all these problems was Santosh Rao… Even the information whether KCR is eating half an idli or a full one is passed on to the chief minister by him.”

She further said that chief minister Revanth Reddy would definitely save him because of his proximity to the ruling party and appealed to the Special Investigation Team to do their job.