The expose of involvement of several banks in money laundering by a news portal has sent the Congress Government in Andhra Pradesh into a tizzy as one of its Ministers has been named in the scandal.
The sting operation by the Cobrapost has claimed that State’s Minister for Primary Education S Sailajanath had assured a friend to stand guarantee for the safety of investment into a real estate project and convert the black money into white.
Though the Minister denied the allegation of any wrongdoing, this has come as a big blow for the State Government which was already reeling under allegations of corruption against several other Ministers. One Minister M Venkatramanna had to resign after he was arrested by the CBI for his involvement in the disproportionate assets case of YS Jaganmohan Reddy. Name of two senior Ministers, Sabita Indra Reddy and Dharmana Prasad, also figure in other chargesheets of the same case.
In fact the report of the sting operation came as such a rude shock that the Sailajanath literally ran away from a condolence meeting in Anantapur district leaving behind his footwear and remained untraceable for more than two hours.
He appeared before the media in the afternoon to deny the allegations and said that even the portal did not say he was involved in money laundering. “This is a conspiracy against me,” he said.
According to the website, Minister’s friend Harikrishna Prasad had asked the Minister for unaccounted money running into crores for investment into real estate project and a former police officer of Andhra Pradesh had agreed to help in transferring the money to Prasad in Tirupati.
But the Minister said that Prasad was an orthopaedic surgeon and a junior to him. “I had put in a word to one Rajesh in good faith as Prasad had told me that he wants to mortgage his land and raise loans,” Sailajanath said.
The Minister has received the backing from his colleagues including the State Congress president Botsa Satyanarayana. “Sailajanath is not a person to get involved in such illegal activities. I Know him for a long time,” he said.