Ex-SIB chief surrenders in phone tapping case
Retired IPS officer T Prabhakar Rao surrendered to Hyderabad police following a Supreme Court order over unauthorized phone tapping during his tenure.
Retired Indian Police Service (IPS) officer and former special intelligence bureau (SIB) chief of Telangana T Prabhakar Rao on Friday surrendered before the Hyderabad police, complying with directions issued by the Supreme Court in connection with the unauthorised phone tapping during the previous Bharat Rashtra Samithi government, people familiar with the matter said.
Rao, the main accused in the case, appeared before the Special Investigation Team (SIT) at the Jubilee Hills police station at 11.00 am, where he was taken into custody for interrogation for the next seven days.
Jubilee Hills assistant commissioner of police (ACP) P Venkatagiri, who is heading the SIT, began the questioning with regard to his role in the alleged surveillance operations.
On Thursday, the Supreme Court asked Prabhakara Rao to surrender before the Telangana SIT and cooperate with the investigating officers probing the alleged illegal phone-tapping case.
A Supreme Court bench comprising Justice B V Nagarathna and Justice R Mahadevan issued the order while hearing Prabhakar Rao’s anticipatory bail petition.
Granting permission to the SIT to conduct custodial interrogation, the bench instructed the investigators to ensure that Rao faces no physical harm during the process.
The Telangana government, represented by senior advocate Siddharth Luthra, informed the court that despite being granted interim protection earlier, Prabhakara Rao had not been cooperating with the inquiry.
Luthra said the court had specifically directed Rao to reset his iCloud passwords and provide access to the data to investigators. However, according to the government’s submission, Prabhakar Rao reset only two passwords, and the data in those two accounts had already been deleted before being handed over, raising concerns over the possible destruction of digital evidence.
Responding to these submissions, Justice Nagarathna asked Prabhakar Rao’s counsel, senior advocate Ranjit Kumar, to explain why the petitioner had allegedly failed to cooperate despite the court’s protective order. Kumar informed the Bench that Rao had filed an affidavit detailing his cooperation with the SIT.
After hearing arguments from both sides, the Bench directed that Prabhakara Rao must surrender before the SIT and permitted the investigators to proceed with custodial questioning under judicial safeguards.
The phone tapping case first surfaced on March 10, 2024, when D Ramesh, the additional superintendent of police (ASP) of the Special Intelligence Bureau (SIB) registered a complaint with the Panjagutta police in Hyderabad, accusing deputy superintendent of police D Praneeth Rao, of illegal phone tapping.
On March 13, 2024, the police arrested Praneeth Rao and further investigations revealed a large-scale surveillance operation targeting various individuals, including political opponents, businessmen, journalists, and even judges.
The police have named six accused in the case, including former SIB chief T Prabhakar Rao, DSP D Praneeth Rao, Additional SPs Mekala Thirupathanna and N Bhujanga Rao and former DCP T Radha Kishan Rao, besides N Sravan Kumar, a television channel owner.
The accused were booked under Sections 409 (criminal breach of trust), 427 (mischief), 201 (disappearance of evidence) and 120-B read with 34 (criminal conspiracy) of the IPC, besides Section 3 of the Prevention of Damage to Public Property Act (PDPP Act), and Sections 65, 66 and 70 of the Information Technology Act.
Prabhakar Rao and Sravan Kumar who had gone absconding for over a year, returned to the state this year after getting protection from the Supreme Court that no coercive action be taken against them. The other four were arrested soon after the case was registered, but all of them are now out on bail.
