Kadapa MP Y.S. Jaganmohan Reddy was on Friday examined by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) in a gruelling session lasting over seven hours in the disproportionate assets case against him.
“I have answered all the questions asked by CBI and I am cool,” the YSR Congress president told reporters after coming out of the Dilkusha Guest House adjoining Raj Bhavan, where he was examined along with three other accused already in the custody of CBI – former minister Mopidevi Venkataramana Rao, promoter of Vanpic Nimmagadda Prasad and bureaucrat K.V. Brahmananda Reddy.
“They have asked me to come again at 10.30 a.m. tomorrow [Saturday] when I will be seeing them to give further clarifications,” Mr. Jagan said before leaving for home at 6.30 p.m.
Sources said Mr. Jagan was examined by CBI Joint Director V.V. Lakshminarayana initially even as the three other accused were being interrogated separately. Later, he was learnt to have been confronted with information gathered from the other three.He parried questions or kept silent when CBI officials asked him about the dates of investments in his companies as a quid pro quo for allotment of land by the YSR government. He was also said to have been asked whether the investments flowed in after the land was allotted.
The interrogation was mostly confined to Vadarevu and Nizampatnam Ports and Industrial Corridor (Vanpic) project and investments received by Mr. Jagan's companies from Nimmagadda Prasad in return for the implementation of the project. Further, he was examined on investments by promoters of Ramky Group, Hetero Drugs and Aurobindo Pharma. The CBI officials tried various methods to extract information. They reportedly put the trio and Mr. Jagan in four different rooms and asked the same questions to corroborate information gleaned from their answers.
The alleged ‘disappearance' of about Rs. 300 crore pertaining to the compensation given to farmers, who gave up their land to Vanpic was posed to all four, it is learnt. While Rs. 450 crore was said to have been paid by the government of Ras-al-Khaimah to meet the compensation, only Rs.150 crore was actually paid to farmers.
