Hyderabad:
The Andhra Pradesh High Court today exempted Tamil Nadu Governor K Rosaiah from appearing in person before an anti-corruption court in Hyderabad on August 2 for an alleged land allocation scam. This was in response to a petition filed by Governor Rosaiah. The summons were issued on the 18th of June.
Mr Rosaiah has been accused of flouting norms in denotifying over nine acres of prime land in the Ameerpet area of the city, worth Rs. 300 crore, in July 2010. Mr Rosaiah was the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh at the time. He is among 13 people accused in the case.
The land was originally in possession of the Hyderabad Metropolitan Development Authority.
An advocate, Mohan Lal, filed a case in the anti-corruption court in December 2010 alleging that as chief minister, Mr Rosaiah approved the denotification of the land in favour of some private parties and caused a loss of Rs 200 crore to the state exchequer.
The anti-corruption officials, after a preliminary investigation, filed a report in the court in March 2011 stating there was no evidence against Mr Rosaiah and as such requested it to close the case.
The court, however, rejected the report that sought to give a clean chit to the former chief minister. The court decided to examine the witnesses in the case following a 'protest petition' filed by the petitioner.
The court then recorded the statements of senior IAS officers C V S K Sarma (then principal secretary to the Chief Minister), T S Appa Rao (then principal secretary of Municipal Administration and Urban Development Department) and B P Acharya (then Commissioner of HMDA) in the case.
Mr Rosaiah was the Chief Minister of Andhra Pradesh till November 2010. He resigned saying his age made it tough for him to continue in office. He also said he faced problems with coordinating the party. Since Mr Rosaiah was promoted from Finance to Chief Minister, he faced considerable opposition from within the Congress, much of it provoked by Jagan Mohan Reddy, whose father was the immensely-popular YSR.
Mr Rosaiah took over as the Governor of Tamil Nadu in August last year.