NTV Chowdary can’t be arrested; HC grants relief
In a major relief to Tummala Narendra Chowdary, NTV chairman and former president of Jubilee Hills Housing Cooperative Society, and five others, the Telangana High Court has granted anticipatory bail to them in a land-related criminal case. The charge against them is that they fraudulently registered a plot worth `40 crore, belonging to a person who settled abroad, by impersonation for `1.91lakh. Dealing with bail petitions filed by Narendra Chowdary, P. Hanumantha Rao, A. Suresh Reddy, Ch Krishna Murthy (all former officebearers of the housing society) and joint registrar D. Srinivasa Kumar as also sub-registrar Pranay Kumar of the registrations department,
Justice Gandikota Sri Devi, however, imposed conditions for their anticipatory bail. They must surrender their passports before the lower court, execute a bond of
`1,00,000, provide two sureties and report every Saturday to the police station where the land case was registered.
As president of Jubilee Hills housing society, first accused Chowdary and others, including the subregistrar of Banjara Hills zone, got a plot registered in the name of B. Sirisha for a sale consideration of
`1.91 lakh and subsequently created a gift deed in the name of this person. This plot had been allotted by the society 30 years ago. The allegations are that the accused forged and fabricated documents to ensure registration of the plot 30 years after it was allotted to
Sirisha, who is now settled in the US. While the original allottee lived abroad, the plot by way of impersonation got registered for a considerable transaction of `1.91 lakh, whereas the market value of the land was of `40 crore. The registration was done by then officebearers in collusion with the sub-registrar without any representation from the NRI and without verifying the identity of the person, as per the case.
During the arguments, assistant public prosecutor D. Sudharshan told the court that the accused is influential and may directly or indirectly make inducements, threats or promises to anyone acquainted with the facts of the case so as to dissuade him from disclosing such facts to the court or to any cop or tamper with the evidence.