Sources in the YSR Jagan Mohan Reddy administration claim that N Chandrababu Naidu, the leader of the Telugu Desam Party and a former chief minister of Andhra Pradesh, was responsible for a 371 crore scandal involving the state skill development corporation.
Following a major incident, Mr. Naidu was detained early this morning at Nandyal, around 300 km from Hyderabad. Supporters of the TDP fought with police officers who arrived in Nandyal to arrest Mr. Naidu. He was ultimately detained and taken to Vijayawada.
Mr. Naidu was referred to as the “prime accused” in connection with the alleged fraud in a statement to the media by a senior official of the state CID. N Sanjaya, Additional DGP of Andhra CID, said that the case’s central theme was the creation of centres of excellence in Andhra Pradesh.
‘The Andhra Pradesh government released 371 crore, of which a big part was syphoned and only a minor part utilised to build the centres of excellence. The majority of this money was misappropriated by employing phoney invoices and shell corporations.
The officer claimed that Mr. Naidu was identified as the “principal conspirator” in the case and that it was under his “active leadership” that government funds were transferred to private organisations via sham firms.
“He is the central figure of this investigation,” the source continued. “He has exclusive knowledge of the transactions leading to the issuance of government orders and the MoU.”
According to state government sources, Mr. Naidu “carefully planned, directed, and carried out the scam.”
The Andhra Pradesh State Skill Development Corporation, created by the previous chief minister Naidu to offer youth job training, is at the crux of the alleged scandal.
With the German engineering behemoth Siemens, the then-TDP administration signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU). The project was supposed to be carried out by the state skill development organisation in collaboration with a group that included Siemens, Industry Software India Ltd., and Design Tech Systems Pvt Ltd. According to the sources, Siemens was charged with creating six centres of excellence.
They claimed that this MoU stipulated that the government of Andhra Pradesh would contribute 10% of the project’s ₹ 3,356 crore cost.
“Show me where my name is.” How can they detain me without even the most basic proof? During the altercation between his followers and police, Mr. Naidu made a statement.
In a later article, he said, “For the past 45 years, I have tirelessly served Telugu people. I’m willing to give my life to protect Telugu people’s interests. The Telugu people, my Andhra Pradesh, and my nation cannot be stopped by anything on earth.
The TDP leader urged forbearance before being carried away, adding, “In the end, righteousness wins.”
According to government sources, there are “questions about transparency” because the project’s documents were not signed by the then-principal finance secretary and the then-chief secretary.
According to TDP spokesperson Kutumba Rao, the probe has apparently discovered alleged GST violations by Design Tech Systems, which had signed a contract with the state skill development organisation. He claimed that when the ED looked into it, it discovered money being diverted to shell firms. According to Mr. Rao, “They are incorrectly attempting to link Chandrababu Naidu to those violations.”
