It has been a week since the national media house Hindustan Times exposed that the Income Tax department had served a show-cause notice to Telugu Desam Party president N Chandrababu Naidu over alleged payment of kickbacks worth Rs 118 crore by an infrastructure group.
For the last one week, Naidu and his partymen remained tight-lipped, despite the massive attack from the YSR Congress party leaders from all sides based on the confession statement of the accused Manoj Vasudev Pardasany (MVP) in November 2019.
MVP, who had taken part in the tendering process in Andhra Pradesh since December 2017 on behalf of Shapoorji Pallonji & Co. Pvt Ltd (SPCL), said in his confession statement, that he had arranged bogus contacts and work orders for siphoning off of funds by SPCL to generate cash through sham sub-contractor companies.
But after keeping silent for a week, Naidu suddenly came out with a statement that he might get arrested any time by the Andhra police.
“I may be arrested in a day or two as he was questioning the YSR Congress Party misrule in the state,” he said at a meeting at Rayadurg in Anantapur district on Wednesday.
He said the government may arrest him tomorrow or the day after or might order raids on him.
“They filed several cases against me in the past, like Amaravati lands, violence at Punganur and Angallu. Now, they say Income Tax notice. I am not afraid. Let them do whatever they want. I have not committed any crime,” he said.
It appears Naidu is anticipating arrest by the Jagan government to see that he would not come out of jail ahead of the assembly elections. But he thinks such arrest would fetch him a lot of political mileage to him in the elections.
“It is just a notice, based on one person’s statement in a case related to 2020. In fact, the same person has retracted his statement later in the court. So, it doesn’t stand in a court of law and Naidu is sure come out unscathed,” a TDP leader said.
This, he said, would only help Naidu, as he can shout from the rooftops that the Jagan government has been harassing him.
“This will definitely get him a lot of political mileage. That is why Naidu openly conveyed the message to the people that the Jagan government may arrest him,” the leader said.
