Hyderabad:
The ongoing feud between Revanth Reddy and KT Rama Rao—which has included exchanges over Telangana hosting the Miss World pageant and the arrest of two women journalists—continued on Thursday with the Chief Minister’s reference to “16 harrowing nights in jail” in 2020 for flying a drone, when KTR’s party was in power.
Speaking in the Assembly this afternoon, the Chief Minister asserted that he had been “unfairly arrested” and sent to a high-security prison that also housed terrorists.
“For 16 days, I was kept in solitary confinement… not allowed to see anyone. Even then, I swallowed my anger and continued working for the state’s welfare,” he said, pointing out that the law only prescribed a Rs 500 fine for the misdemeanour he was charged with.
He claimed his cell had bright lights left on all night and was unsanitary and unhygienic, declaring, “If needed, I can take MLAs and ministers there to show them the reality.”
Upon his release, Mr. Reddy claimed he slept under a tree to “recover from the ordeal.”
Mr. Rao—who this month labeled the Chief Minister a “mad dog”—hit back, asking his rival, “Did you go to jail for participating in the freedom struggle? If someone flies a drone over your Jubilee Hills palace and takes photos of your wife or children… will you stay silent?”
“When it is about your family, you react,” he thundered, referring to Mr. Reddy’s outburst last week against social media posts that, the Chief Minister claimed, insulted his family members.
Responding to the BRS’s condemnation of the arrest of the women journalists—who were granted bail but only after a week in custody—Mr. Reddy had said, “… how long should I be tolerant when bad language has been used against the women in my family?” and called for offenders to be “stripped and paraded.”
The “16 harrowing nights” reference was to a case in which Revanth Reddy was accused of piloting a drone over KT Rama Rao’s farmhouse. Mr. Reddy was arrested and jailed for two weeks.
However, last week the Telangana High Court quashed the complaint, noting that the area had not been declared a prohibited zone and that there was no mention of KTR or his farmhouse in the police complaint. The court also observed that the charges in the FIR involved misapplied provisions.
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