Suspended SIB DSP Praneeth Rao arrested, remanded to 14-day judicial custody

HYDERABAD: The Hyderabad City police officially announced the arrest of suspended DSP of Special Intelligence Bureau (SIB) D. Praneet Rao.

He was produced before a court and is remanded to 14 days of judicial custody.

The police arrested him on the charges of being involved in offences of criminal breach of trust by a public servant; causing disappearance of evidence; criminal conspiracy, etc.

The case was registered by Punjagutta police station.

Commissioner of Hyderabad City Police K Srinivas Reddy announced on Wednesday morning that Praneeth Rao was arrested and the questioning was on.

In fact, the special parties of police conducted reconnaissance at Praneeth Rao’s residence in Sircilla.

He was in the news for the last few days for charges of spying on many people and recording their calls by resorting to phone tapping and also by destroying hard disks consisting of sensitive data.

According to the Deputy Commissioner of Police (DCP) of west zone, based on a complaint by D Ramesh, Addl. SP, SIB, on March 10, a case was registered in Cr No 243/2024 u/s 409, 427, 201, 120 b, r/w 34 IPC, 3 PDPP Act, 65,66,70 IT Act-2000 against D Praneet Kumar alias Praneeth Rao and others for:

• Developing profiles of unknown persons and monitoring the same clandestinely, un-authorisedly and illegally
• Causing disappearance of records, both physical and electronic, from the SIB office
• Copying intelligence information into his personal drives illegally in collusion with unknown persons misusing and abusing his official position
• Causing destruction of certain computer systems and other official data of the SIB along with the clandestinely obtained data by him un-authorisedly and illegally by turning off the CCTV cameras in collusion with others with an intention to make wrongful gain for himself and others.

The investigation was taken up by P. Venkatagiri, ACP Jubilee Hills and team

As the investigation done so far revealed that there was prima facie evidence against Praneeth Kumar alias Praneeth Rao, he was apprehended on March 12 at around 10.30 pm at his house in Sircilla.

During the further course of investigation, the accused person has confessed to have committed the offences reported in the case in collusion with some other persons. He was arrested on March 13 at around 3 am and was produced before the Court seeking judicial custody. The Court remanded him to judicial custody for a period of 14 days. He was lodged in Chanchalguda Central Prison. Further investigation is under progress.