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Naidu condemns IT raids, stages dharna in front of EC office at Amaravati
Naidu’s unusual action followed a series of transfers of officials by the EC acting on complaints from the YSR Congress party and the Bharatiya Janata Party and raids by central agencies like the Income Tax department on the TDP leaders.
Accusing the Election Commission of initiating “draconian and unilateral decisions” targeting a select few officials of the Andhra Pradesh government, Telugu Desam Party president and chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu on Wednesday staged a dharna in front of the EC’s office in the state secretariat at Amaravati.
Naidu’s unusual action followed a series of transfers of officials by the EC acting on complaints from the YSR Congress party and the Bharatiya Janata Party and raids by central agencies like the Income Tax department on the TDP leaders.
On Tuesday night, the EC transferred Prakasam district superintendent of police Koya Praveen and replaced him with another IPS officer Siddharth Kaushal. The EC also transferred Mangalagiri and Tadepalli inspectors of police, falling under Mangalagiri Assembly constituency where Naidu’s son Nara Lokesh is contesting.
Around the same time, the Income Tax department authorities conducted searches at the residence of TDP law maker Jayadev Galla’s chief accountant in Guntur.
In the last couple of weeks, the EC transferred Chief Secretary Anil Chandra Punetha, intelligence chief AB Venkateswara Rao, Kadapa SP Rahul Dev Sharma, Srikakulam SP Venkata Ratnam and Prakasam SP Praveen, besides quite a few inspectors and sub-inspectors. DGP RP Thakur was relieved of ACB’s additional responsibilities. The YSRCP had complained against these officers.
Before sitting on a dharna along with other TDP leaders, Naidu dashed off a nine-page letter to Chief Election Commissioner Sunil Arora and submitted a copy of it to AP chief electoral officer Gopalakrishna Dwivedi.
In the letter, Naidu alleged that the decisions taken by the EC were aimed at benefitting the BJP and YSRC. “There is no change in the EC attitude even after 66 former bureaucrats petitioned the President of India pointing out its biased attitude. If the EC wants to favour the YSRC and BJP, let it campaign for those parties directly,” he said and vowed that he would not spare the EC in his fight to save democracy.
He sought to know why no searches were conducted at the residences of even a single leader from YSRC. “Haven’t they committed any electoral offences? What have they found in their raids on our leaders? Is there no democracy?” he fumed.
Naidu alleged that the EC had never acted on a single complaint lodged by the TDP, while it had acted swiftly on the frivolous complaints from the YSRC, without even bothering to verify the facts.
“We objected to the appointment of KK Sharma, an RSS man, as law and order observer for elections. West Bengal threw him out indicating his RSS leanings. There has been no action on our objection. But, when YSRC or BJP lodged a complaint, the EC took action within hours. Why can’t the EC come here and campaign for YSRC?” Naidu asked.
On Tuesday night, Jayadev also staged a dharna in Guntur town, following the Income Tax raids on the house of Gurrappa Naidu, chief accountant of his company Amara Raja Batteries.
Galla, the richest candidate in the Lok Sabha elections, has accused the Narendra Modi government of targeting him for political reasons. “This is nothing short of fascism and it smacks of an emergency-like situation. Modi is trying to influence the elections by selectively targeting the TDP leaders in Andhra Pradesh,” he alleged.
According to Galla, the chartered accountant was picked up from his house and detained for six hours for questioning. He was let off at around 11.30 pm after Galla staged a dharna in protest against the alleged detention of his company official. Unconfirmed reports said the authorities had confiscated unaccounted cash of ₹30 lakh from Naidu.
