Telangana Industry Minister KT Rama Rao has sent defamation notices of Rs 100 crore to state Congress president A Revanth Reddy and BJP state chief Bandi Sanjay Kumar with an ultimatum to withdraw their allegations of the TSPSC paper leak against him or face defamation suit.

The notice stated that unless the leaders refrained from making defamatory statements against him, casting aspersions and damaging his reputation and tendered public apology, Rao will take further legal action and file a defamation suit in the courts of competent jurisdiction.

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“Thus, through this Notice, my client calls upon you to refrain from making any further derogatory/defamatory statements/imputations in any form against my client and tender an unconditional apology forthwith to my client by conducting similar press meets by withdrawing your statements made which are extracted above, else my client shall be constrained to prosecute you for an offence of defamation which is punishable under Section 500 of the IPC apart from claiming damages to the tune of Rs 100 crore by initiating appropriate proceedings in the Courts of competent jurisdiction holding you solely responsible for all the costs and consequences thereof,” read the notice.

Rao had earlier stated that there was a terrible conspiracy hatched by the BJP and the Congress to stall the entire recruitment process. While Revanth Reddy accused Rama Rao’s personal assistant Tirupati of involved in the paper leak, the BJP chief had alleged involvement of the minister himself in the question paper leak.

A Special Investigation Team (SIT) of the Hyderabad Police, which is investigating the case, had served notices to both the politicians to appear before it. Although Reddy appeared before the SIT, BJP chief Bandi Sanjay Kumar chose to ignore the summons twice.

The minister accused the Opposition leaders of provoking the job aspirants and appealed to them to ignore the provocations and prepare for the retest announced by the TSPSC.

Meanwhile, Rao wrote a letter to Union Urban Development Minister Hardeep Singh Puri on Tuesday to reconsider the decision to reject the proposal of Hyderabad Metro Phase II from Ladkikapul to BHEL and Nagole to LB Nagar on grounds of feasibility since the ministry sanctioned Metro projects for cities with less traffic. He accused the Centre of “pure discrimination and step-motherly treatment to Hyderabad and Telangana.”