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In a major embarrassment for the Telugu Desam Party (TDP), one of its MLAs in Telangana state was caught red-handed while allegedly bribing a ruling Telangana Rashtra Samithi (TRS) MLA for his vote in favour of the party candidate in the legislative council (MLC) elections.
On Sunday Anti-Corruption Bureau (ACB) sleuths arrested A Revanth Reddy , MLA, from Kodangal constituency in Mahabubnagar district and also two others in connection with the offer of bribe to Elvis Stephenson, a nominated MLA belonging to TRS following a raid based on the latter's complaint.
A video footage that captured the conversation that allegedly took place between Reddy and Stephenson about the 'deal' and Rs 50 lakh cash that was brought as an advance payment to their meeting place was played by all the local television news channels through out Sunday and Monday.
ACB filed an FIR against Reddy and three others under sections of Prevention of Corruption Act as well as section 120 B (criminal conspiracy) of Indian Penal Code (IPC).
The accused TDP MLA has alleged that theTRS government has falsely implicated him with bribery charges in a bid to silence the opposition in Telangana.
On the other hand, the opposition Congress as well as YSR Congress parties demanded that the name of TDP president and Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu also be included in the FIR. In the video footage shown by the electronic media, the TDP MLA was seen informing Stephenson that he came at the behest of his boss.
The arrest came a day ahead of the election for 6 vacancies in Telangana Legislative Council. While the TRS has a comfortable strength of over 80 MLAs to win 5 out of 6 MLC posts, there was a keen contest for the sixth post among the major political parties including the TDP which was running short of a couple of MLA votes for the requisite number.
