Hyderabad: CA, accomplice held for impersonating as Personal Secretary to Minister KTR

Hyderabad: The Rachakonda Commissionerate's Malkajgiri Zone Special Operations Team (SOT) sleuths, along with Ghatkesar police, arrested a Charted Accountant (CA) for impersonating himself as Personal Secretary (PS) to Minister K T Rama Rao along with another accused. They seized fake letter of credit (LC) document issued from Chief Minister's Office (CMO), net cash of Rs 1.75 lakh and three mobile phones from their possession.

According to the police, the accused Rupakula Karthikeya (51) posing himself as Srinivas, PS to KT Rama Rao and his associate Fredric Taylor (44), a mechanical engineer, used to call officials and insist them to do an official favour. Further, they indulged in cheating activities and collected lakhs of rupees from vulnerable people. Both the accused are friends and living in Secunderabad area.

Karthikeya, while working for private companies, was looking after consulting works like preparation of business proposals, project reports and financial modules for the companies. He was also involved in getting government approvals for companies and on official work he used to visit frequently to the Secretariat and meet officials. Meanwhile, he gathered information about the personal secretaries, who are working in K T Rama Rao's office. By colluding with Fredric and impersonating himself as Srinivas, he used to call from his mobile to government officials and private offices and order the concerned official to do the favour immediately.

The accused contacted an administrative officer in a women's college at Marredpally and secured an admission for a student after collecting Rs 90,000.

Later, the administrative officer, believing him as PS to the Minister, requested him in getting treatment for his son under the government scheme. For that, Karthikeya promised him to arrange LC for Rs 2 lakh towards medical expenses. Both the accused prepared fake LC as issued from the CMO and gave it to him, who in turn submitted the LC in the private hospital and got the treatment done.

Later, when the hospital authorities found the LC to be a bogus, they immediately informed the beneficiary about the cheating. Shocked with the incident, when he tried to contact both the accused over phone, their mobiles were switched off. When he went to Minister's peshi, he came to know that they had cheated him. On December 6, he approached Ghatkesar police and lodged a complaint. The police registered a case and took up investigation.

Earlier, the accused met headmistress of a ZP high school in Nalgonda district, who was working as the coordinator of an Open School and cheated her by saying that they would help her in cancelling her transfer orders. The duo prepared a fake letter on a government letterhead and wrote a recommendation letter to the Commissioner of Telangana Open School Society and requested to continue her services as the concerned officer. The police also found that both of them cheated many persons by promising them help in regularisation of buildings and allocation of house pattas.