YS Jagan Mohan Reddy moves Hyderabad High Court for independent probe

Hyderabad: YSR Congress president and leader of the opposition in AP, Y.S. Jagan Mohan Reddy, on Wednesday moved the Hyderabad High Court seeking a direction for an investigation into the murder attempt on him at Visakhapatnam airport on October 25 through an appropriate independent agency not functioning under the control of the AP government and its DGP.

He told the court that he moved the petition aggrieved by the abuse of the entire criminal justice administration by the AP government presided over by Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu. He complained of various wrongful actions by the DGP of the state and assistant commissioner of police, North division, Visakhapatnam city, at Mr Naidu’s behest. He prayed for exposing and unearthing a cause of serious conspiracy that needed to be properly investigated under the criminal justice administration in terms of constitutional and legal provisions.

He submitted that the failure of the respondents to undertake such action in the legally provided manner was being challenged as unlawful, ultra vires and unconstitutional under the premises indicated thereinafter.

He submitted that within an hour of the attack occurring, the DGP of the state addressed a press conference indicating and stating that the assailant was a fan of YSR Congress party and the attack was apparently done for the purpose of seeking publicity as the attack was on the left shoulder.

He told the court that the CM addressed a press conference on the same day stating that the attack was an orchestrated effort to defame the government and also referred to the attack as being a part of Operation Garuda undertaken by the Central government to unseat him as CM.

He submitted that the CM also made various false and frivolous accusations to indicate that the attack was not a serious one by contending that after alighting at Hyderabad airport, he had gone home and, upon advice given by other political party leaders and phone calls from BJP leaders in Delhi, he had proceeded to a hospital from his house and got admitted only for the purposes of trumping up publicity.

He told the court that the CM further trivialised the issue by stating that the wound on the shoulder of the petitioner was only 0.5 cm in depth; however, the doctors who had actually treated him had confirmed that the cut was indeed 3.5 cm in depth, necessitating 9 stitches, with four for a torn muscle and others for the skin.

Mr Jagan Mohan Reddy submitted that it was shocking to imagine that this incident could have quite conceivably resulted in an injury to the carotid artery, resulting in fatal consequences and that this was what was primarily intended by the perpetrators and was narrowly missed, thanks to divine intervention and his reflex action.

He brought to the notice of the court that the assailant was a TD sympathiser and was a senior office bearer of the party’s village unit. Meanwhile, it is the mobile phone call data record (CDR) of the accused, J Srinivasa Rao alias Srinivas that is going to speak about the suspected involvement of other persons and the motive behind the attack on Jagan.  The SIT intensified the investigation.