National Investigation Agency (NIA) team will leave for Jharkhand to investigate a Naxal funding case which dates back to August – when the brother and business partner of a top CPI (Maoist) leader were caught with over Rs 37 lakh in cash and gold.
CPI (Maoist) leader Sudhakar’s brother B Narayan and business partner Satyanarayan Reddy were arrested by Ranchi police in the Jharkhand capital. The Rs 25 lakh cash and half a kilo of gold biscuits they were carrying were meant for Sudhakar’s family in Telangana. It was Narayan’s PAN card and Reddy’s Aadhaar card that gave the duo away.
The NIA sleuths will investigate close associates of Sudhakar, as well as his properties.
The agency will look into an inter-state module involving Jharkhand and Telangana. The Maoist trail to Telangana will be actively probed.
The NIA team is waiting for official orders.
Top sources said Sudhakar collected levies from his known associates in Palamau, Garhwa, Latehar, Lohardaga, Gumla and Simdega districts – collectively called the Koyal Sankh Zone – for his personal consumption. This, sources say, was part of a retirement plan.
But officials believe Sudhakar wasn’t operating from just two states.
Sudhakar, sources believe, has also been extorting money from businessmen involved in mining, road construction and other activities in forested areas in Chhattisgarh, Maharashtra and Odisha.