Hyderabad, Dec 2 (IANS) The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) Friday arrested Obulapuram Mining Company (OMC) director B. Rajasekhar in an illegal mining case.
A CBI official said the investigating agency arrested Rajasekhar at Bellary in Karnataka. They were bringing him to Hyderabad to present him before the court.
He is the fifth accused to be arrested in the high-profile case and this latest arrest came just a couple of days before the CBI is to file a charge sheet in the court.
Former Karnataka minister G. Janardhana Reddy, his brother-in-law and OMC managing director B.V. Srinivasa Reddy, former state mines director V.D. Rajagopal and Indian Administrative Service (IAS) official Y. Srilakshmi are already in the jail.
Rajasekhar is brother-in-law of Rajagopal, the former managing director of the Andhra Pradesh Mineral Development Corporation (APMDC) already in jail.
According to CBI officials, Rajagopal and Srilakshmi showed undue favours to OMC by granting leases for iron ore mining in Anantapur district.
Srilakshmi was secretary of industries department in late Y.S. Rajasekhara Reddy’s government when OMC was granted mining lease.
The senior officer was arrested Dec 28 and after three-day CBI custody, she was sent to jail Thursday. The officer, who was family welfare commissioner at the time of the arrest, was suspended by the state government.
The CBI arrested mining baron Janardhana Reddy and Srinivasa Reddy in Bellary Sep 5 in the illegal mining case booked in 2009.
The investigating agency claims to have evidence that OMC mined iron ore in Karnataka but illegally transported it to Anantapur and exported it in the name of OMC.
All the accused are currently lodged in Chanchalguda Central Jail here.
