Andhra: Parchur TDP MLA Sambasiva Rao, 4 others booked for bribing voters in 2019 poll

Bapatla: Andhra Pradesh police have booked the Chairman of Nova Group and Parchur TDP MLA Yeluri Sambasiva Rao, and his associates Pullela Ajay Babu, Appa Rao, Baji Babu, and Sai Ganesh for bribing voters in the 2019 assembly poll.

This case was filed after obtaining permission from the jurisdictional court.

The FIR was registered under section 123(1) RPA 1951,171-E r/w 120B IPC,155(2) CrPC.

According to the FIR, TDP MLA along with four other accused had allegedly bribed electors to vote for him during the 2019 poll. He contested the election from the Parchur constituency and eventually went on to win the seat.

On January 24, a search under section 67(2) of the APGST Act, 2017 was conducted by the Andhra Pradesh State Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (APSDRI) at the premises of Nova Agri Tech Pvt. Limited, in Guntur.

During the search, a diary containing handwritten pages was discovered, revealing information about the bribing of voters during the 2019 election. The contents of the diary were about the cash inflow and outflow for the illegal distribution of money to the voters just before the 2019 election date of April 11, 2019.

The diary which was recovered in the presence of independent witnesses P.V. Narayana, an employee of Nova Agri Tech Pvt. Limited, implicated Pullela Ajay Babu, an ex-employee who retired from the company.

When requested to explain the entries in the diary, Pullela Ajay Babu fled and switched off his phone.

By observing the dates and names of the villages, booth-wise number of votes mentioned, transport charges mentioned for outside voters, and other details, prima facie it appeared that illegal money was routed through unknown and unexplained channels and utilized to bribe the voters for gaining undue advantage in the general elections of 2019.

According to the officials, the expenditure was not brought to the notice of the Election Commission. The employees and key persons related to the Nova group of companies were deployed to carry out the illegal transactions on behalf of the contesting MLA candidate, Sambasivan Rao.

Sambasiva Rao won the seat from Parchuru AC. Money was distributed in the villages including Duddukuru, Inkollu, Tahtiparthivaripalem, Gangavaram, etc and it was recorded in the diary.

One entry showed the delegation of work to three employees -- Apparao, Bujjibabu, and Saiganesh-- regarding the distribution of Rs.15 lakh to the voters of village Duddukuru which comes under the Paruchuru constituency.

The information was forwarded to the Bapatla police. Later, police wrote to the Income Tax, Enforcement Directorate, and Securities and Exchanges Board of India about the illegal activities

Further, the flow of money from the Nova group of companies into intermediary bank accounts and by the withdrawal of cash for the apparent illegal activities is being examined.