In the Formula E Scam Case, ACB officials have set a deadline for BRS Working President KT Rama Rao to submit his mobile and laptop, by Wednesday evening. However, KTR after taking a legal opinion, is reportedly refusing to hand over his mobile and laptop to the ACB. The lawyers have reportedly advised him that there is no need to hand over electronic items to the ACB.
The lawyers said that KTR personally played only a limited role in this Formula E scam, besides the case is related to a government transaction and not a personal conversation. The government already has access to the memorandum of understanding (MoUs) related to this issue, as well as all the agreements made with the respective institutions, and that when every cash transaction was officially done through banks.
Tey are expressing the view that the ACB did not have the right to ask for personal information of KTR, who was the minister at that time. The lawyers said that there were no legitimate reasons behind asking for a mobile phone number just for political harassment when all this was available to the government.
The lawyers reminded that the High Court and the Supreme Court have given several judgments in the past that it is unfair for investigative agencies to use the information collected from a citizen against the same citizen. Moreover, they said that there is no need to give personally used phones without any court order and when there is no direct connection with the allegations.
The ACB officials are investigating the Formula-E car race affair, especially regarding the release of funds to the race management company FEO (Formula-E Operations). It is learnt that IAS officer Arvind Kumar has explained during the ACB interrogation about the WhatsApp conversations between him and KTR before transferring funds from HMDA accounts to FEO.
With this, it is learnt that the ACB officials have asked KTR to hand over the cellphones and laptops used at that time. With this, the ACB officials are preparing for a joint interrogation of KTR and senior IAS officer Arvind Kumar.
