Hyderabad: Senior BRS leader T Harish Rao challenged Revanth Reddy, stating that if the chief minister was willing to allow a House committee investigation into his relatives and associates’ alleged corruption, he was also ready for a similar probe into his own relatives and associates.Addressing the media on Sunday, Harish said there was no need for either a House committee or a CB-CID inquiry and instead proposed that a sitting judge investigate the matter. He questioned whether the chief minister had the courage to agree to such an investigation.Harish alleged that the govt was acting defensively and resorting to counterattacks because minister Ponguleti Srinivas Reddy’s company was involved in corruption. He said the govt was using diversionary tactics because it had no answers. He also claimed that BRS leader Kaushik Reddy was being threatened for questioning the govt over corruption and demanded that Revanth Reddy be referred to the ethics committee for allegedly using inappropriate language in the assembly.Harish said the alleged mining corruption should be investigated by a sitting judge rather than the CB-CID, adding that everyone was aware of the minister’s wrongdoing. He demanded Ponguleti’s dismissal, saying that a fair investigation was not possible while he remained in office. He further alleged that a penalty of Rs 28 lakh had been imposed on the minister but had not been paid, and said the pollution control board had failed to act.Accusing the govt of making repeated mistakes to cover up one error in the assembly, Harish said a letter had been submitted to the speaker seeking a sitting judge-led probe into 20 issues. He added that they had stood for four and a half hours without being allowed to speak and challenged the govt to set up a house committee on Ponguleti.
