Lokesh appears before CID for 2nd day in Amaravati case

Amaravati, Oct 11 Telugu Desam Party (TDP) General Secretary Nara Lokesh appeared before the Crime Investigation Department (CID) for the second day on Wednesday for questioning in the Amaravati Inner Ring Road alignment case.

Lokesh, who was questioned by the CID officials for six-and-a-half hours on Tuesday, reached the CID office at Tadepalli on Wednesday morning.

After questioning him on the first day, the CID had served notice to Lokesh under section 41A of the Criminal Procedure Code, directing him to appear again.

Lokesh, a former minister and son of former Chief Minister N. Chandrababu Naidu, had said after the questioning on the first day that he was asked 50 questions by the CID officials and 49 of them were not related to the Inner Ring Road case.

The TDP leader said he was ready to answer the remaining questions of the CID officials but they were not ready to continue the interrogation after 5 p.m. Lokesh had told the CID officials that he has to go to Delhi for consulting lawyers and that he was ready to answer all their questions even if it was late.

Lokesh had told the media after questioning on the first day that instead of asking him the questions the CID officials could have searched for answers on Google.

"What are you and what was my position when I was working for Heritage. The other query was what position I was holding in the TDP government,” Lokesh said and observed that the answers for such questions are easily available on the Internet.

Making it clear that no evidence with regard to the case has been produced before him, Lokesh felt that it has become a habit for this government to take revenge on the Opposition and those who raise their voice against the policies of the ruling party.

"When I have not done anything wrong there is no question of my getting afraid of anyone," Lokesh maintained.

Lokesh is the son of TDP supremo Chandrababu Naidu, who is already in judicial custody in the Skill Development scam.

The CID has already named Naidu as an accused in the Amaravati Inner Ring Road case and AP FiberNet case and filed Prisoner Transit (PT) warrant petitions against him in Vijayawada ACB Court.

In May 2022, the CID had registered an FIR against Chandrababu Naidu, former municipal administration Minister Dr P. Narayana, Heritage Foods Ltd, and others, for alleged irregularities in the construction of an internal ring road in Amaravati.

The FIR was filed based on a complaint from YSR Congress Party (YSRCP) Mangalgiri MLA A. Rama Krishna Reddy. It was alleged that certain illegal and corrupt activities were committed by highly placed government officials between 2014 and 2019 with regard to the design of master plan for the Andhra Pradesh capital and alignment of the ring road to cause wrongful gain to certain individuals.

Heritage Foods is a company owned by Chandrababu Naidu’s family.