AP: Police hoping to quiz two MPs, seven MLAs

HYDERABAD: The ‘list’ of people waiting for Assembly speaker Nadendla Manohar’s ‘nod’ has just gone up.The latest to join the list are the Hyderabad City police.Investigators probing the unauthorised sale of Tatkal railway tickets by three touts, who used signed letterheads of politicians to secure reservation under the emergency quota (EQ), are all set to seek the speaker’s permission to question the public representatives.Letterheads of two Rajya Sabha members - MV Mysoora Reddy and Ratna Bai - too have been seized.Topping the list of signed blank letterheads is TDP MLA from Boath, Nagesh, whose 76 letterheads were seized.Sources associated with the investigation told Express that the investigators seized about 130 letterheads of politicians, which were used to secure the railway emergency quota.Besides the two Rajya Sabha MPs, letterheads of seven MLAs and two former MLAs _ Shobha Hymavati and K Nageshwar Reddy _ have also been seized.About 30 letterheads are filled-in and the remaining blank.Interestingly, all letterheads are signed by the public representatives but the investigators say that they will have to probe whether the signatures of the politicians are genuine or forged.‘’We will take the speaker’s permission once he is available and record the statements of all the politicians whose letterheads have been seized,’’ the sources said.Of 10 public representatives, two are MPs.While two belong to the Congress all others belong to the TDP.Simultaneously, investigators are roping in forensic experts to see if the signatures are genuine or forged.Sources said that besides recording the statements of public representatives, the role of their personal assistants (PAs) will also be probed.‘’It is very common for them to always keep stock of blank letterheads signed by an MP or MLA.Some charge `500 per letterhead for securing emergency quota,’’ they said.Interestingly, on some letterheads that were seized, the accused, using a whitener, erased the name of the MLA while in a few others, the original name and date for which the letterhead was actually given, was erased and in those places other names and dates were incorporated.While Saifabad police is probing the case, railway police have also been roped in.Sources said they would be probing the linkages, if any, between the three accused Syed Vali Peeran, K Ramakrishna and B Giri Babu with railway staff who release the emergency quota.