New Delhi: Magunta Sreenivasulu Reddy, the sitting MP for Ongole in Andhra Pradesh, who left the Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy-led YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) to join the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), is expected to run in the upcoming general elections from the same constituency under the TDP banner, which is part of an alliance with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Jana Sena Party.
Both Sreenivasulu Reddy and his son Raghava, along with other YSRCP leaders, joined the TDP on 16 March.
ThePrint has learnt that Sreenivasulu Reddy is likely to be the TDP’s candidate from Ongole where he had registered a massive victory over TDP’s candidate Sidda Raghava Rao by over 2 lakh votes in the last general elections.
“Negotiations are in the final stage and Sreenivasulu Reddy is all set to contest from Ongole,” a leader close to Reddy told ThePrint.
Raghava was arrested by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) in the Delhi excise policy case, but he later turned approver in the case and secured bail.
The probe into the Delhi excise policy case for 2021-22 has led to the arrest of several high profile leaders, such as Arvind Kejriwal, Chief Minister of Delhi, and K. Kavitha, Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) MLC and daughter of former Telangana CM K. Chandrashekar Rao.
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Reddys’ alleged role in infamous excise policy
According to the ED’s prosecution complaints — the agency’s version of chargesheet, which ThePrint has seen — Sreenivasulu Reddy was the prominent member of the alleged ‘South Group’, which allegedly paid a kickback of Rs 100 crore to Kejriwal’s Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).
The ED has quoted Sreenivasulu Reddy’s statement, recorded under Section 50 of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA) on 14 July, 2023, in which he allegedly confessed to having explored opportunities for his liquor business in Delhi, for which the agency alleged he paid Rs 25 crore through K. Kavitha.
Sreenivasulu Reddy has allegedly told the ED that he saw that the AAP government was privatising the liquor business in Delhi, and he met the Delhi CM on 16 March 2021 to seek opportunities.
He said in the statement that Kejriwal informed him that K. Kavitha was already in touch with him and had offered to pay Rs 100 crore to the party in exchange for opportunities.
According to Sreenivasulu Reddy, Kejriwal also allegedly suggested that either he should get in touch with Kavitha or she can call him to discuss the plan.
“Following this, K. Kavitha called Magunta Sreenivasulu Reddy on 19 March 2021 and asked him to meet her. Next day, Sreenivasulu Reddy went to meet her at her residence in Hyderabad. In that meeting, K. Kavitha told him that Arvind Kejriwal had spoken to her and asked her to give Rs 100 core, and accordingly she asked Sreenivasulu Reddy to arrange Rs 50 crore for the same,” the ED said in its prosecution complaint.
According to the complaint, Kavitha allegedly told Sreenivasulu Reddy that her chartered accountant (CA) Butchibabu Gorantla (or Buchi Babu) will visit him and his son Raghava to coordinate for the same.
“Buchi Babu visited them the next day and Raghava Magunta told him that he could arrange Rs 30 crore, and finally Rs 25 crore was paid in cash to (businessman) Abhishek Boinpally and Buchi Babu on the instructions of K. Kavitha,” the complaint alleged.
Raghava Reddy, in his statement recorded on 26 July last year, allegedly told the ED that he paid Rs 25 crore in cash to Abhishek Boinpally and Butchibabu Gorantla according to the “agreement” between himself, his father and K. Kavitha.
Meanwhile, Kejriwal contradicted Sreenivasulu Reddy’s statement in his direct address to the court Thursday and said that the MP had met him seeking help in acquiring land for his family trust in Delhi.
“Magunta Sreenivasulu Reddy, who is an MP, came to my official residence on 16 March 2021 seeking land in Delhi for his family trust to which I informed him that the issue of land was L-G’s jurisdiction and that I would forward his application,” Kejriwal said, in contradiction to Reddy’s statement recorded on 14 July 2023.
“Sreenivasulu Reddy had not named me in his first three statements. Then after his son’s arrest, he named me and his son got bail and pardon in the case. His son gives seven statements and only the last one features my name. Only those two statements, which implicated me, get mentioned on record by ED. Why are not all of their statements on record?” the Delhi CM asked.
Arrest, bail and plea for approver
Raghava Reddy was arrested by the ED in February last year, while Sreenivasulu Reddy was questioned by the agency on several occasions.
In June 2023, Raghava Reddy was granted 15-day interim bail by the Delhi High Court on grounds of his mother-in-law being admitted to a hospital, which was later trimmed to five days after the agency moved the Supreme Court seeking stay on the HC’s order.
The following month, Raghava Reddy secured bail for four weeks on medical grounds, which was modified into an “absolute” bail in August as the ED did not oppose his bail plea in the Delhi High Court.
In October 2023, he was granted pardon and was made an approver in the ED case after court approval, while his plea to become an approver in the CBI case under section 306 of the Code of Criminal Procedure (CrPC) was approved by the court earlier this month.
(Edited by Richa Mishra)
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