Telangana: Ex-SIB Chief Surrenders in Phone Tapping Case; Police Allege Judge Surveillance, Electoral Bond Link to BRS

Hyderabad: T. Prabhakar Rao, the former chief of the Telangana Special Intelligence Branch (SIB), surrendered before the Jubilee Hills police on Friday morning, complying with a Supreme Court order.

His surrender marks a significant development in the phone-tapping case that has roiled the state’s bureaucracy and political circles since the Bharat Rashtra Samithi (BRS) lost power in December 2023. Rao, identified as a key accused, is currently being questioned by the Special Investigation Team (SIT).

As investigators begin custodial interrogation, The Wire has examined the specific allegations Rao is facing. These are detailed in a counter-affidavit filed by Hyderabad Commissioner of Police Kothakota Sreenivasa Reddy in the Telangana high court, as well as internal administrative records from the state’s IT department.

The documents present the police’s contention that the state intelligence apparatus was diverted from its mandate to serve political interests. However, the affidavit relies heavily on the custodial confessions of junior officers arrested earlier this year to substantiate its most serious claims.

Surveillance of judiciary

In a submission suggesting a potential constitutional breach, the commissioner’s affidavit states that the investigation has found evidence of surveillance on the judiciary.

According to the police, the accused officers operated out of “two rooms exclusively” within the SIB headquarters, utilising 17 computer systems connected through dedicated leased lines to monitor targets clandestinely.

Citing the confession of co-accused Nayani Bhujanga Rao (A-3), the police allege that this unit, the ‘Special Operations Team’ (SOT), monitored the movements of a sitting high court judge, Justice Sarath Kaja.

The affidavit claims the objective was to profile the judge to potentially “influence or counter” him regarding government-related cases. It is pertinent to note that this specific claim is based on the admission of a co-accused while in police custody, evidence that is typically subject to high scrutiny during trial.

The police further allege that the SOT, originally mandated to combat Left Wing Extremism (Maoists), was diverted to profile journalists, student union leaders, and members of the ruling party to ensure loyalty.

The electoral bond link

The investigation also explicitly links the SIB’s operations to the purchase of electoral bonds.

The affidavit details the case of a businessman, Saranala Sridhar Rao of Sandhya Convention, who was allegedly tracked and pressured by SIB officers regarding a civil dispute. The police state that Rao was involved in a dispute over an “HPCL Petrol Bunk issue in Hi-tech City” and was “facing a lot of criminal cases in Cyberabad”.

According to the affidavit, SIB officers intervened in these disputes. The document alleges that to resolve the pressure and “be at peace with the BRS Government”, the businessman yielded.

“Sridhar Rao yielded and purchased Electoral Bonds from SBI worth Rs 13 crores in favour of BRS party,” the affidavit states, adding that an additional Rs 2 crore was allegedly paid in cash for a “compromise”.

Destruction of evidence

While the targets of the surveillance remain a matter of investigative deduction and confession, the police argue that the destruction of state property is supported by physical evidence.

The affidavit details that on December 4, 2023 – the day after election results were announced – officers led by Deputy Superintendent of Police Praneeth Rao (A-2) switched off CCTV cameras at the SIB headquarters.

The police submit that hard drives from 17 computer systems and servers were physically removed and destroyed using electric cutters. The investigation team claims to have recovered cut fragments of these drives from the Musi River near Nagole, based on the directions of the accused. Investigators also noted finding “burnt remnants of documents” and “burnt spiral binding wire” at the SIB office, suggesting a physical purge of paper trails alongside the digital wipe.

The police argue this destruction constitutes a deliberate attempt to screen evidence of illegal operations, resulting in the loss of decades of genuine anti-insurgency intelligence.

The "Golden Record"

Distinct from the police affidavits, The Wire has also reviewed 659 pages of internal administrative correspondence from 2016 to 2023 regarding the ‘Integrated People Information Hub’ (IPIH) or ‘Samagra Vedika’.

These documents confirm that the state government systematically merged data from over 30 departments – including electricity bills, water usage, and voter IDs – to create a ‘Golden Record’ or 360-degree profile for every resident. The records show that this massive data integration was contracted to a private vendor, Posidex Technologies, raising data security questions.

Crucially, a 2017 letter from the then-Commissioner of Police, Hyderabad, to the IT department explicitly requests access to this integrated database for “Efficiency in Law Enforcement”. Further, administrative documents, including a January 2019 letter from the Adilabad Collectorate, show specific efforts to map voter ID cards against welfare beneficiaries.

While the stated objective was to plug “leakages” in welfare schemes such as the Aasara Pension, the documents reveal a political dimension to the data gathering, confirming that the infrastructure for mass profiling was active years before the specific crimes alleged in the current probe.

Due diligence

The investigation is unfolding in a highly charged political atmosphere. The primary target of the alleged surveillance mentioned in the police affidavit is the “RR Module” – referring to Revanth Reddy, the current chief minister of Telangana.

The affidavit highlights that Prabhakar Rao, who retired as Inspector General of Police (IGP) in June 2020, was re-appointed by the BRS government as “Chief of Operations” for the SIB, effectively allowing him to continue leading the unit outside the standard police hierarchy.

Consequently, the probe is being led by a police force reporting to the very administration that was allegedly victimised. While the physical destruction of hard drives points to a cover-up, the specific narratives regarding the judiciary and political funding rely on the prosecution establishing the veracity of custodial confessions in court.

With Rao now in custody, the SIT is expected to confront him with both the recovered physical evidence and the statements of his former subordinates.

This is the first part of a series of reports in the case.

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