Hyderabad: AP police made use of deportation procedures to bring red sanders smuggler Kollam Gangi Reddy to India from Mauritius as extradition was likely to be delayed. Gangireddy explored all possible legal avenues in vain to escape the AP police.
CID chief D. Tirumal Rao played a major role in bringing the fugitive to India. He went to Mauritius to represent the AP police. Police tracked Gangi Reddy when he booked a ticket from Morocco to Mauritius and alerted Interpol. Reddy hid himself in Dubai, Ghana, Madagascar, Singapore and other countries after entering as a tourist with a fake passport.
Senior AP police officials said that the Union ministry of external affairs took special interest in Gangi Reddy’s case. Gangi Reddy, who has now been brought to Hyderabad, will be produced at the Proddatur court as he has been convicted in a case. Two Mauritius police officers accompanied Gangi Reddy to Hyderabad via New Delhi from Mauritius.
Read: Gangi Reddy made around Rs 400 crore
DGP J.V. Ramudu said it took eight months to bring Gangi Reddy to India after his arrest in Mauritius in February by the Interpol. Since extradition was time-consuming, a relatively easier option was deportation. “He had a fake passport and that helped us to get the deportation process done,” said the DGP. In order to trap Reddy, the AP police had requested the ministry to revoke his passport.
AP police had requested Interpol to publish a Red Corner notice on Reddy and got him arrested when he reached Mauritius.
In March this year, the second addl. district judge of Proddatur had issued a conviction warrant of arrest against Gangi Reddy and a memorandum of instructions to produce him before court in a murder case, in which he was convicted.
No threat to life: DGP
AP DGP J.V. Ramudu rubbished Gangi Reddy’s complaint that he and his family were “facing a threat to life from the AP police and government.” Gangi Reddy had told a Mauritius court that he would be killed in a fake encounter by the AP police if he was handed over. The DGP rejected allegations that smugglers who had the support of the TD were let off by the police. On whether he was facing pressure from TN government not to arrest another smuggler, the DGP said, “I cannot deny that. But we will definitely go ahead.”
Gangi Reddy: I am a businessman
Gangi Reddy says that he was just a businessman and was traveling to Dubai and other places for business purposes. Though he filed a statement in a Mauritius court that he faced a life threat in AP he changed his version in front of the media and said he faced no threat from the government. Denying allegations about his criminal background he said that he was arrested because his time was bad. “I have a mineral waterbusiness in Dubai. I went there in connection with that and I was not hiding,” said Reddy. He denied that he married a second time.
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