The Telangana High Court on Thursday granted conditional bail to the three accused in the TRS MLA poaching case while the Special Investigation Team (SIT) probing the allegation submitted the evidence before another bench revealing the involvement of BJP’s National General Secretary (Organisation), BL Santosh.

The SIT report indicted Ramchandra Bharti in the poaching case submitting the details of the audio and video clips, screenshots of chats on WhatsApp, photographs as well as statements of witnesses to the court.

According to the SIT report, Ramachandra Bharati and BL Santosh were acquainted over a long time. It submitted screenshots of WhatsApp chats between the two from August 2021. There was a meeting between the 2 at Haridwar on 11 April and the team submitted a photo of the two, phone location and statement of Munjagalla Vijay as evidence.

Bharti also provided an update on Telangana operation on 26 April to Santosh through WhatsApp. There was another meeting on 15 October to finetune the conspiracy at 10 am in the residence of Santosh where Bharti, Nanda Kumar, Tushar and Mujagalla Vijay attended.

This was confirmed again through phone location and confession of an advocate Prathap Goud. Another accused Simhayaji had held a meeting with political leaders of other parties such as Congress and Telangana Jana Samithi.

The SIT has made BL Santosh the fourth accused in the case.

Justice Chillakur Sumalatha directed the 3 accused – Kore Nanda Kumar, Ramachandra Bharti and Simhayaji to furnish Rs 3 lakh surety for each person and told to appear before the SIT on every Monday between 10:30 am and 12 pm till the filing of the chargesheet. They were also asked to submit their passports to the investigators.

After the ACB court rejected the remand following the arrests of the 3 accused, the High Court had ordered their fresh arrest and they were remanded to judicial custody. The judge observed that the accused had been in prison for a month and material part of the investigations were complete.

Although the trio was granted conditional bail there are other cases against Nandu Kumar, pertaining to a property in Film Nagar and also against Bharti, who has several aadhaar cards and passports in his name including a forged one