Willing to surrender before minister: Bengaluru ex-corporator

Bengaluru May 9 (IANS) Bengaluru s former independent corporator V. Nagaraj evading arrest since April 14 after seizure of demonetised currency from his office-cum-residence on Tuesday offered to surrender before Karnataka Home Minister G. Parameshwara.

My (other) condition for surrender is that police should withdraw cases foisted against me said Nagaraj.

Parameshwara is a gentleman. I trust him more than Chief Minister Siddaramaiah who is corrupt and untrustworthy. I am ready to surrender before the Home Minister Nagaraj said in an audio-video clipping his counsel Sriram Reddy released to Kannada news channels here.

Nagaraj 54 was a corporator of Bruhat Bengaluru Mahanagara Palike (BBMP) in 2002-07 from Prakashnagar ward.

He is absconding after police raided his office-cum-residence in the city s western suburbs and allegedly seized Rs 14.8 crore in demonetised Rs 500 and Rs 1 000 notes from there.

Police has formed three special teams to look for Nagaraj.

I have no comments to offer on Nagaraj s conditions to surrender. We are looking for him and his two sons Additional Commissioner of Police (Crime) Hemant Nimbalkar told reporters here.

A city court on May 5 rejected Nagaraj s anticipatory bail plea filed on April 17. He was fearing arrest on charge of exchanging banned notes for new ones after the November 8 demonetisation.

In another audio-video tape on April 22 Nagaraj accused police of filing a false case against him and feigned ignorance about the source of banned notes found on his premises.

I know nothing about the banned notes. They belong to the Chief Minister s Special Personal Assistant Manjunath. The raid on my house and office is illegal as it has been carried out without a court warrant to implicate me in money laundering or eliminate me in an encounter the former corporator had claimed.

--IANS
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