Jagan Reddy targets CBI but will it backfire?

by T S Sudhir If you happen to visit the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) office at Sultan Bazaar in Hyderabad, you should take every step with care. Not because its the CBI office but because the flooring is slippery. The tiles may well have been deliberately chosen to unnerve visitors. One wrong step and you could be on all fours. However, it would seem in the last one week, it is the CBI that is negotiating some bad bounce on this flat surface. Remember, CBI is currently investigating the very high-profile case of YS Jaganmohan Reddy’s disproportionate assets. A case that has had YSR Congress accusing the CBI of targetting an “innocent” Jagan for political reasons. [caption id=“attachment_361282” align=“alignleft” width=“380” caption=“Reddy is accused of getting companies to invest in his companies in exchange for state government concessions. PTI”]  [/caption] What made matters difficult for Jagan’s party was that the man heading the CBI in Andhra Pradesh - Joint Director V V Lakshminarayana - has the reputation of being an upright officer with a no-nonsense approach. An IPS officer of Maharashtra cadre with a brilliant track record, Lakshminarayana has handled several high profile cases at the CBI since 2006, among them the YSR chopper crash probe, Ramalinga Raju fraud, Maoist Azad encounter case, EMAAR scam, Sohrabuddin encounter case and the Gali Janardhana Reddy mining scandal. But it is the latest file on his table relating to Jagan, that has brought him into direct confrontation with the YSR Congress. The party’s agenda was to prove that Lakshminarayana nurses a personal animosity against Jagan and wanted to fix him, with help from `anti-Jagan media’. `Operation Lakshminarayana’ undertaken by the YSR Congress and Sakshi media group managed to procure his mobile phone’s Call Data Records (CDR) in a clandestine manner and worse, leaked it. The details, if true, show that Lakshminarayana made several phone calls to select mediapersons. The charge is that he was leaking information on Jagan’s case and interrogation, that showed the latter in a poor light. There was collateral damage also inflicted, perhaps deliberately. The CDR also included details of the number of calls made to Vasireddy Chandrabala, who was Lakshminarayana’s college classmate and now works in an IT firm in Hyderabad and calls made from her phone to a mediaperson. A mischievious invasion of her privacy. Chandrabala has explained that she and Lakshminarayana interacted because they were working together on youth empowerment programmes at their old school. Insiders in the CBI say the stakes in this case are so high that it was but expected that those involved would use any ammunition that they can lay their hands on and fling at the officer. Lakshminarayana has now lodged a complaint with the Hyderabad police stating his cellphone call list was revealed by Jagan’s party with malafide intention and that the reporting on Sakshi TV had harmed his image. Accusing the reportage of insulting him and impinging on his fundamental rights, Lakshminarayana has pointed fingers at a politician’s relative, accusing him of procuring the data through dubious means. Chandrabala has also approached the State Human Rights Commission and complained to the police that by spreading rumours, the Sakshi media group’s act “intended to insult the modesty of a woman”. The question that arises is whether Lakshminarayana as the chief investigating officer, was indeed `planting’ anti-Jagan stories in the media and whether the CBI manual  allows that. Those who know Lakshminarayana well say he is not the kind who hankers for media publicity. In fact, he has the habit of calling up to rebut stories or point out inaccuracies in the reports. CBI officers say Lakshminarayana has even called up Sakshi reporters to state his position on their stories, but the leaked CDR has deliberately chosen only to highlight numbers of reporters working in media that are not pro-Jagan to buttress their argument that the officer was `planting stories’. Earlier this year, Lakshminarayana had changed his mobile number to avoid too many calls from journalists. He even changes his drivers frequently to avoid eavesdropping on his phone conversations. Despite his security being upgraded after he began handling these cases, Lakshminarayana is wary of his security personnel keeping close tabs on his movements. And anyone who has interacted with Lakshminarayana will tell you he is far from forthcoming with information and will share precisely only that much which may be necessary at that moment. Nothing more. CBI insiders say in this case, Lakshminarayana is not guilty of parting with any information that is not true. While that may or may not be true, he could have avoided interacting with the media when the investigation was at a critical stage. It is surprising that despite being such a fine professional officer, Lakshminarayana was tactless in using his official phone to talk to mediapersons, in Andhra Pradesh’s polarised media environment, divided on political lines. But then the counter argument is that if he had anything to hide, he would taken care to acquire half a dozen other sim-cards to make those phone calls. Interestingly, the CBI does allow for officers to talk to journalists if they think they will get information that will be useful to their investigation. But at a time when the CBI is already accused of being partisan and labelled as the ‘Congress Bureau of Investigation’, exhaustive reportage of what happens inside the CBI interrogation room only lends credence to what has been exposed. It is ironical that despite the act of leaking the CDR being highly unethical, the alleged selective leaks by Lakshminarayana have increased the credibility of YSR Congress party’s claims. And for once, the otherwise supercool Lakshminarayana has got a bit rattled. Political circles say that having tasted blood, YSR Congress will throw more dirt. The attempt, it would seem is to get the officer transferred out of this case and Andhra Pradesh as he is already on an extension here. The hope is that Lakshminarayana himself may want to leave rather than be subjected to a below the belt vilification campaign. For the moment, the officer has decided to spend the next fifteen days in South Africa to participate in `International Conference of Investigative Agencies’. Away from the cesspool of Andhra Pradesh politics that is clearly beginning to resemble a Telugu political potboiler.