Main accused in Vaishnavi case held, sent to custody

Vijayawada, Feb 8: The Vijayawada police on Monday arrested and produced Venkatrao Gowd, the prime conspirator in Naga Vaishnavi’s murder case, before the magistrate.Venkatrao has been remanded in judicial custody till Feb 22 by the first additional chief metropolitan magistrate.  Later, the  accused was shifted to the district jail.As all the four accused in the incident were arrested, the police may file a petition in the court seeking police custody for the accused in the next two days.As reported earlier, Venkatrao and Srinivas hired two professional killers to kidnap Naga Vaishnavi, daughter of business man Palagani Prabhakar.

The Satyanarayanapuram police filed a petition in the court seeking a 10-day police custody for Venkatrao. The police have stepped up investigation in the case. The other suspects in the case are being interrogated in Vijayawada and Guntur. The police identified the callers from cell towers.As Venkatrao is a Praja Rajyam Party leader, the police are keeping a tab on the movements of his close aides in the party. The police seem to have gathered information on the businesses of Venkatrao and his private panchayats.