In 2007, Rao's third son Venkat was accused of killing his friend and business partner over a land dispute. He was acquitted in 2008.
BRS Telangana MP in Rajya Sabha K Keshava Rao. (Creative Commons)
On 30 November, 2022, G Bhasker Rao, a resident of New Jersey in the US in his 70s, received an email — purportedly from the income tax (I-T) authorities in India — mentioning a penalty of ₹1.4 crore over his wife’s property in Hyderabad’s Banjara Hills area.
Shocked after seeing the email, 72-year-old G Jayamala and her husband Bhasker Rao immediately asked their family members in Hyderabad to make inquiries with the officials.
It turned out that Jayamala, who has been living in the US for 35 years, was a victim of alleged land fraud.
It was not the first case of this kind, and would have been lost among other such cases of land fraud had it not been the names of the accused.
In the FIR filed by Jayamala at the Banjara Hills Police Station on 13 June, the accused were named as brothers Viplav Kumar and K Venkateshwar Rao, sons of the BRS’ Rajya Sabha member and former Congress leader K Keshava Rao.
They are also siblings of Greater Hyderabad Municipal Corporation (GHMC) Mayor Vijayalakshmi Gadwal.
As per the FIR, accessed by South First, Jayamala stated that the accused brothers hatched a conspiracy to grab the property of 469 square yards (4221 square feet), belonging to her, on Road Number 12 in Banjara Hills.
They allegedly forged the signature of Jayamala and fabricated the sale deed (a document which establishes property ownership) by impersonating Jayamala before registration authorities.
The accused brothers sold the sale deed of the property at a meagre amount of ₹3 lakh against the then-existing government market value of over ₹2.13 crore, the FIR stated.
“The complainant did not convey details about the property to anyone. The registered sale deed was a fraud committed by the accused to grab prized land through impersonation and forgery,” the FIR added.
Banjara Hills Police Station Station House Officer (SHO) M Narender told South First, “We have issued a notice under Section 91 of the CrPC and asked the complainant (Jayamala) to give the supportive documents of the property.”
The property was bought by Jayamala in 1983 along with one P Sudarshan Reddy from Sheikh Ali Bin Ahmed through a registered sale deed, the FIR noted.
After receiving a copy of the fabricated sale deed, Jayamala sent it to the Hyderabad-based Truth Lab Forensic Services.
In the report cum opinion of the Truth Lab, the signatures of the complainant in the standard (original) documents — as provided — did not match the signatures in the impugned registered sale deed, which showed that the document was forged and fabricated.
“We will also be submitting Truth Lab’s report to the government’s Forensic Science Laboratory (FSL). Then they will decide on the forgery and fabrication. Only after that will further investigation be conducted,” said the SHO.
Meanwhile, Jayamala, in the FIR, claimed that it was Viplav who claimed to be her attorney holder and forged the signature on the fabricated sale deed.
“The recitals therein are false, incorrect, and are nothing but the creation/fabrication of the accused solely to grab the valuable property of the complainant,” the FIR said.
The FIR added that Jayamala had neither authorised nor instructed any third person — including Viplav Kumar — to execute the “fabricated” sale deed.
While the FIR was registered on 13 June, it came to light only on 16 July. It mentions that when the complainant (Jayamala) went to the Banjara Hills Police Station on 12 April, the SHO did not register an FIR.
On 15 April, she wrote a letter to Hyderabad Commissioner of Police CV Anand and the assistant commissioner of police urging them to direct the SHO to register an FIR against the accused brothers.
“But the higher authorities paid no heed to the requests of the complainant,” Jayamala said in the FIR.
Seeking justice, the NRI moved a local court last month, which ordered the Hyderabad police to book BRS MP Keshava Rao’s sons.
The police have booked the accused brothers under several IPC Sections pertaining to dishonesty and forgery —417, 464 and 465 (forgery and its punishment), 468, 470 (forged documents), 471, and 120(b) of the IPC. They have also been booked under Section 156(3) of the CrPC.
In September 2007, Keshava Rao’s third son Venkat Rao allegedly shot dead his friend and business partner Prashanth Reddy with his licensed revolver pertaining to a land dispute in the Ranga Reddy district.
He later got himself admitted to a hospital due to “shock” and called the incident a case of suicide.
Keshava Rao resigned as the head of the Andhra Pradesh unit of the Congress in the wake of the murder charges against his son.
However, in 2008, a sessions court acquitted Venkat.
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