Daijiworld Media Network – Bellary (SP)

Bellary, May 17: The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) officials who arrived in the town on Wednesday, raided the houses of Murali from Kaul Bazaar here, and Srinivas Reddy from Sandur, said to be close associates of mining baron, Janardhan Reddy, who is in a jail in Hyderabad since the last 18 months. The arrests were made relating to the disappearance of huge stock of iron ore weighing about 50 lac tonnes that was seized by the forest department at Belekeri port near Karwar in February 2011. The raid was conducted by a team led by CBI inspectors, Shivanna and Mahendra.

While the arrested persons have been taken to Bangalore for interrogation, another CBI team has stayed back in the town. It may be recalled that Kharadapudi Mahesh and Swastik Nagaraj were arrested relating to the case sometime back.

Murali was looking after the banking transactions of Janardhan Reddy. The officials are said to have recovered important documents relating to mining transactions from the houses of these two persons. They also seized various documents and hard disks from the houses of the arrested persons. The two were questioned for sometime at the CBI office in Anantpur road in the town, before taking them to Bangalore in the evening.

The team that stays put in the town is planning to visit mining areas in Hospet, Sandur and nearby places to collect more materials relating to the case. There is a possibility of the team making further arrests, it is learnt.