With the CBI Special Court summoning Roads and Buildings Minister Dharamana Prasada Rao in connection with Vampic fraud case against YSRCP president and Kadapa MP Y S Jaganmohan Reddy, Chief Minister N Kiran Kumar Reddy is in a quandary.
Now, it is to be seen whether the Chief Minister accept the long-pending resignation of Dharmana, who chose to relinquish office no sooner he was named by the CBI in its fourth charge-sheet, and forward it to Governor Narasimhan for approval or will he drag the issue for some more time on pretext of consulting legal luminaries, is the question.
Time is running out and more than anyone else, his cabinet colleagues, who received notices from the Supreme Court on the issuance of controversial 26 GOs, appear more concerned and worried. If the Chief Minister accepts Dharmana’s resignation, they fear that their case may be weakened in the Supreme Court, notwithstanding the fact that they had been provided legal assistance by the government through a GO to defend themselves.
In fact, all the four accused in the Vampic land scam, including principal accused Y S Jaganmohan Reddy are languishing in the Chanchalguda Central jail for the past 100 days. Besides Jagan, the other accused are Vijay Sai Reddy (Jagan’s personal auditor), industrialist Nimmagadda Prasad and former minister Mopidevi Venkataramana. With the CBI Special Court taking cognizance of the fourth charge-sheet filed by the CBI, which included Dharmana Prasada Rao’s name as accused no.5 and two senior IAS officers Manmohan Singh and Samuel, many feel their arrests too are inevitable.
In this backdrop, will the Chief Minister take the risk of accepting resignation of Dharmana and put another four of his cabinet colleagues – Sabita Indra Reddy (Home), Dr Geeta Reddy (Major Industries), Ponnala Lakshmaiah (IT) and Kanna Lakshminarayana (Transport) – into risk? Many feel the Chief Minister is left with few options and he has already been given a ‘free hand’ by none other than the party supremo Sonia Gandhi, during his meeting with her in Delhi some time back to take a decision either way, which he feels in the best interests of the party and his government.
In fact, when majority of his cabinet colleagues brought pressure on him not to accept Dharmana’s resignation, the Chief Minister had taken up the issue with Sonia Gandhi, who, in turn, gave the nod to take whatever decision which would not harm the interests of the party. Whatever might have transpired between him and the party chief, the general impression the media got, was the Chief Minister was asked to consult legal experts before taking a decision on the resignation. Thus, the party chief, perhaps wanted to put Kiran Kumar Reddy on test.
Whatever the decision Kiran Kumar Reddy choose to take – accept or reject – it will have far-reaching repercussions on his political future as well as the government. If he accepts the resignation of Dharmana in a bid to give an impression that his government was committed to take Jagan’s DA case to its logical conclusion, then the CBI may go after the other four ministers and more than half a dozen IAS officers, who were responsible in the issuance of the controversial GOs benefiting the Business houses with huge land allotments and in turn made huge investments in Jaganmohan Reddy’s publications as ‘quid pro quo’ arrangement. Such a decision also bound to weaken the defense of those half a dozen ministers who have received the SC notices in those controversial 26 GOs issuance. If he doesn’t, then the case against Y S Jaganmohan Reddy’s alleged ‘quid pro’ case through which his media houses received huge investments, may as well be weakened. Apparently, the Chief Minister is caught between the proverbial ‘Devil and Deep Sea’ kind of a situation! (NSS)