Internal feud in Congress leads to police raid on Youth Congress’s social media war room

HYDERABAD: Internecine feuds between Congress warlords snowballed into a major controversy, leading to a police raid on the social media war room of youth Congress president Shiva Sena Reddy.

Interestingly, the sordid episode exposed the internal bickering within the Congress and impaled the fact that it was former TPCC president and Nalgonda MP N Uttam Kumar Reddy who had lodged the complaint that triggered the police raid. Ironically, the Youth Congress leaders tried to shift the blame on to the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) for the raid.

As the saga unfolded, Cyberabad Police raided the social media war room of the Youth Congress, the youth wing of the TPCC located in Banjara Hills, on Monday and took away laptops and documents containing valuable data. It was further alleged that the ruling Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) party, which was insecure about the positive role played by the youth wing of the grand old party in Karnataka, was behind the swoop by the police.

TPCC vice-president Kiran Kumar Chamala told the media on Tuesday that two plainclothesmen raided the Youth Congress office in Banjara Hills following the victory of the Congress in the neighbouring state of Karnataka.

The Congress functionary also said that he was not sure if the two men who took away the laptops were “actually police or BRS party goons.”

Who gave the complaint?

NewsTAP tried to contact the police stations concerned to find out who actually lodged a complaint against the social media office which eventually led to the raid and the confiscation of the so-called important documents and data.

The question was whether the BRS was involved in the raid as alleged by the Youth Congress.

While Station House Officer of Jubilee Hills Police Station S Rajeswar Reddy made it clear that his station had nothing to do with the raid, the Station House Officer at Banjara Hills M Narender, under whose jurisdiction the Youth Congress social media war room falls, too denied involvement of his men saying that there was no complaint against the war room.

The plot became much more intriguing as both the police stations come under the West Zone, and Deputy Commissioner of Police D Joel Davis made amply clear that none of the two police stations were involved in the alleged raid.

A common apprehension by the police was that an intra-party rivalry might have led to the raid.

Uttam did it?

Youth Congress president Siva Sena Reddy said in a statement that N Uttam Kumar Reddy, MP, had given a complaint long ago against the social media war room that was working under TPCC Chief A Revanth Reddy.

According to Shiva Sena Reddy the social media wing was drafting the “Hyderabad Youth Declaration” at the time of the swoop.

“Uttam Kumar Reddy gave a complaint against us a long time back and the police are now showing it as a reason for the raid,” he told journalists at Gandhi Bhavan.

“If a particular person is behind spreading false information, the police should arrest him but they should not take away our systems. The police have so far not confirmed the raid. We will also investigate if some others have joined the raid as coverts and working against us,” he added.

Cyber Crimes clarifies

Meanwhile, on Tuesday the Cyber Crime Police of Hyderabad Police Commissionerate clarified that four sleuths raided the office which was close to MP Uttam Kumar Reddys’ residence, at 6 pm on Monday and seized mobile phones from two persons, computers, hard disks, and documents after searching the office for more than an hour.

The police said that they received a complaint from Uttam Kumar Reddy on May 5, 2023, that false news was spread against him from the Youth Congress office run by one Prashanth. The Cyber Crime police after zeroing in on the source of the social media news items, raided the office. The police summoned Prashanth for further questioning on Tuesday.