Hyderabad: Almost two years after a retired high court judge reported that two persons collected 2.5 crore from his family in 2021 towards investment in electoral bonds of a party at the Centre and duped them, the case has been transferred to the Central Crime Station (CCS) for investigation by senior officials, citing the complex nature of the fraud and money routing. Though the fraud took place in 2021 and a case was registered in 2021, no one was arrested in the case till date.On Feb 27, 2024, Justice (retd) DSR Varma, 74, who had worked in the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh and Allahabad high courts, lodged a complaint with the Film Nagar police, alleging that two persons, Narendran and Sarath Reddy, duped him and his family of 2.5 crore in 2021 by promising to issue electoral bonds and secure decent placements in the US for him and his grandchildren.
“The common grievance of my family, including me, is that in spite of collecting huge amounts, no bonds were issued to us in spite of my requests. This is a clear violation of the recent judgment of the Supreme Court deprecating the collection of amounts by way of electoral bonds. In the present case, in spite of my insistence for issuing me bonds, no such thing happened,” the complainant had alleged in the FIR registered at the Film Nagar police station.On the complaint of the former judge, the Film Nagar police had registered a case under Sections 406 (criminal breach of trust), 420 (cheating) R/w 34 (common intention) of the Indian Penal Code (IPC) against Narendran, who contacted the judge through his relatives and sought funds for a party at the Centre (to be acknowledged through bonds), and Sarath Reddy, a construction businessman, who collected the amount from the judge’s wife and daughter through bank transactions.“The investigating officer examined the complainant and witnesses and recorded their statements in detail. Based on the witness statements, confessions, and financial evidence, including bank transactions and WhatsApp chats, the names of three more accused, Srinath Desai, Kumar, and Chaitan Kumar, were added to the case. Some of the accused are from Karnataka,” a senior police officer said.The Film Nagar police said that they recorded statements, but no one was arrested in the case. Looking at the nature of the allegations and the quantum of the misappropriated amount, additional CP (crimes) M Srinivasulu transferred the case to CCS for further probe and it was re-registered on Friday under the same sections against five accused.“The case involves misappropriation of 2.5 crore, with multiple accused, complex banking transactions, fund routing, and inter-state linkages. Considering the gravity of the offence and the need for specialised financial investigation, CCS was entrusted with the probe. We will analyse the probe done so far and plan the further course of investigation,” a CCS officer said.
