The AP CID officials have filed one more case against TDP chief N Chandrababu Naidu on Thursday. This time it was on the sand mining in the state during 2014 and 2019.
The CID registered the case following a complaint by the AP Mineral Development Corporation managing director V G Venkata Reddy. He alleged that the free sand policy was introduced in 2016 without taking into consideration any legal procedure.
He said that the state had introduced a new sand policy in 2014 giving all mining activity to the APMDC. The sand reaches were given through a tender cum e-auction process. However, in January 2016, the sand policy was changed, and the sand reaches were given to the district and mahila samakhyas.
Again, in March 2016, within three months, the sand policy was changed, and free sand policy was introduced. This free sand policy had no cabinet approval or has any legal acceptance, the CID officials said in the FIR.
It was alleged that in the name of free sand policy, the sand mining was given to the ruling party leaders, including MLAs. The ruling party leaders made a huge amount of money out of the sand mining activity, the CID said.
The state exchequer lost heavily due to the free sand policy, the CID said and added that the ruling party leaders gained so much at the cost of the state government. The seigniorage too was lost to the state, the CID said.
The CID officials named Chandrababu Naidu as A2. Former minister Peethala Sujatha was named A1, Chanthamaneni Prabhakar as A2 and another former minister Devineni Umamaheswara Rao was made A4.
This was the fifth case filed against Chandrababu Naidu. He was arrested in the skill development case and was sent to judicial remand. Later, cases were filed in fibernet scam, Amaravati inner ring road scam and liquor permits scam.
