CBI arrests Reddy

In a move that took many by surprise, the Andhra Pradesh division of the CBI took time off from its investigation into the assets of YSR Congress chief Jaganmohan Reddy and swooped down on former Karnataka BJP minister G Janardhana Reddy and arrested him at his Bellary residence in the early hours of Monday. Charged with illegal mining of iron ore in Anantapur district, Janardhana Reddy, owner of Obulapuram Mining Company (OMC), and his relative and MD of the company, BV Srinivasa Reddy, were brought to Hyderabad and produced before the CBI special court on Monday evening. The court remanded the duo to judicial custody till September 19, and sent them to Chanchalguda jail. Even as the accused moved a bail petition, the CBI sought their custody. Both petitions are slated to be heard on September 7. The arrests were made nearly two years after an FIR was filed in the case. The duo was taken to Hyderabad from Bellary in an Innova, a 7-hour drive. In a press note, the CBI said that apart from Janardhana Reddy’s residence in Bellary, simultaneous raids were also conducted on his Race Course road residence in Bangalore from where other material was seized. A CBI team also raided the residence of B Sriramulu, former Karnataka health minister and a close associate of Janardhana Reddy, in Bangalore. Although the opposition TDP had been alleging since 2005 that the Congress government in AP had been turning a blind eye to illegal mining by OMC in Anantapur because of Janardhana Reddy’s proximity to YS Rajasekhara Reddy’s family, things moved only after the death of YSR in September 2009. Unable to contend with the campaign carried out by the TDP and the communist parties in the AP assembly and outside, then chief minister K Rosaiah was forced to write to the Centre to seek a CBI inquiry into OMC’s illegal mining.