AP chief minister Chandrababu Naidu on Sunday refuted a audio recording of an alleged conversation between him and nominated Telangana MLA Elvis Stephenson in the cash-for-vote scandal in which he is allegedly heard promising to honor whatever his representatives had promised.Telangana CM KCR and his government have released a telephonic conversation of Chandra Babu Naidu and Stephenson to the Media. Denying that it is Naidu’s voice, the Andhra Pradesh government has taken the release of audio tape seriously and vowed to fight it legally, constitutionally and politically. During the conversation, Naidu purportedly assured the nominated member that he is with him. “Our people briefed me. I am with you don’t bother. For everything I am with you. What all they spoke we will honour,” a voice purported to be that of Naidu’s is heard telling the legislator. Andhra CM Naidu lands in trouble over purported phone conversation. The audio tape was first played by T News, a Telugu news channel owned by ruling the TRS, and was later picked up by others. Telangana Chief Minister K. Chandrasekhar Rao met Governor Narasimhan at Raj Bhavan while Naidu called a meeting with Andhra Pradesh Director General of Police J.V. Ramudu and other officials to take stock of the latest situation. Rao’s meeting with the governor, the second in three days, came minutes after the release of the audio tape. Telangana TDP legislator A. Revanth Reddy was arrested by the ACB on May 31 when he was offering Rs.50 lakh to Stephenson to make him vote for TDP-BJP candidate in the elections to Telangana legislative council. ACB, which had laid a trap on a complaint by Stephenson, also arrested Revanth Reddy’s aides Sebastian Harry and Uday Simha. Parakala Prabhakar Advisor (Communications) to the Andhra government strongly denied reports saying that the tapes were fabricated and the AP government will take up the issue seriously.The reported conversation suggested that the Andhra CM was giving “assurance of all sorts” to the MLA if he voted for the TDP nominee in the Telangana Legislative Council election.Prabhakar further alleged that the Telangana Government is trying to malign the image of the AP chief minister by resorting to cheap tactics. He pointed out that under section 8 of the Andhra Pradesh Reorganisation Act, the governor is responsible for law and order, protection of lives and property of people and vital installations in Hyderabad.
