T'gana BJP chief sent to 14-day judicial custody in paper leak case

HYDERABAD: A court in Telangana's Warangal district on Wednesday sent state BJP chief and Karimnagar MP Bandi Sanjay Kumar to judicial custody for 14 days in Class 10th question paper leak case.

Sanjay, who was arrested amid mid-night drama in Karimnagar, was produced before fourth Additional Junior Civil Judge-cum-Judicial First Class Magistrate in Hanamkonda on Wednesday evening. After hearing both sides, the magistrate remanded him to judicial custody till April 19.

The BJP leader's lawyers moved a bail petition before the magistrate. It was not clear if the petition would be heard on Wednesday night or the next day.

The police are likely to shift Sanjay to Khammam Jail.

Police named Sanjay as the accused number one in the case. He allegedly hatched a plan with other accused to leak the 10th class question paper.

In its remand report, police said that it is a case of pre-planned and evil designed conspiracy, malpractices in SSC public examination with an intention to create rumours and provoke a breach of peace of the ongoing public examination in the state.

According to police, Sanjay hatched a plan with the help of accused number two Boora Prashanth and accused number three Moutam Shiva Ganesh to leak out the ongoing SSC papers by taking a photo of a question paper in the cell phone.

According to police, A1 gave direction to A2 to exploit the situation of leakage of Telugu question paper which happened on April 3 and leak and circulate Hindi paper on April 4 as well to create fear among the students and their parents and to defame the duly elected state government.

Out of total 10 accused in the case, police have arrested five and served notice on a juvenile, a 10th class student.

Bandi Sanjay, Boora Prashanth, Gundaboina Mahesh and Moutam Shiva Ganesh have been arrested.

Pogu Subash, Pogu Shashank, Dhoolam Srikanth, Perumandla Shramik and Pothanaboina Varsith are absconding.

They have been booked under Indian Penal Code (IPC) sections 120B (criminal conspiracy), 420 (cheating), 505 (circulating any report or statement with an intent to cause alarm to the public)

Police have also invoked sections 4 (A), 6 of TS Public Examinations (Prevention of Malpractices) Act and 66-D of Information Technology Act.

The sections are non-bailable and if convicted the guilty may get a jail sentence of 3 to 7 years.

Police said Sanjay spoke to Prashanth several times on phone and chatted with him before and after the leak.

Warangal Police Commissioner A.V. Ranganath said Sanjay refused to give his mobile phone to police and deleted a lot of data. "If he is innocent, why is he hiding the phone," he asked.

The commissioner said they would retrieve the call and chat data even if it was deleted. "We will approach WhatsApp and phone service provider to retrieve the data," he said.

The police chief said this was part of a conspiracy to bring the government to disrepute and to dilute the examination system.