The Central Bureau of Investigation on Tuesday supported the demand of Narreddy Sunitha, daughter of slain former MP Y S Vivekananda Reddy, for shifting the hearing of the latter’s murder case from Andhra Pradesh to either Hyderabad or Karnataka.
In a counter-affidavit filed in Supreme Court, the CBI counsel said whatever Sunitha said in her petition about intimidation of the investigating officers by the Andhra Pradesh police was absolutely true. The case will come up for hearing again on Wednesday.
In the affidavit, the CBI allegation that the state police had colluded with the accused in the Viveka murder case and were harassing the investigating officers by filing private cases against them.
The CBI counsel said a police official, who filed a case against the CBI stating that it was forcing him to issue a false statement, was given promotion.
“The state police are trying to deliberately dodge the case as long as they can by acting according to the directions of the accused,” the CBI said.
It may be mentioned that Sunitha filed a petition in the Supreme Court asking for shifting of the case to some other state, particularly Telangana. The petition came up for hearing in September.
Senior counsel arguing for Sunitha Reddy in the case Siddhartha Luthra brought to the notice of the Supreme Court bench said she had lost faith in the ongoing investigation by the CBI into her father’s murder case in Andhra Pradesh.
“The local police and the politicians are intimidating the investigating officers of the CBI. The accused are filing private cases against the CBI officials and are threatening the witnesses,” Luthra said.
Since there is no security to the CBI officials probing the murder case, it is better the investigation be entrusted to the CBI court in other state, supervised by the high court there, like Telangana, so as to ensure fair probe, Luthra said, quoting Sunitha.
