Vijayawada MP Lagadapati Rajagopal wants to file a defamation suit against Sakshi daily. The strange thing is that his own brother Lagadapati Sridhar had invested in the paper by buying shares worth Rs 50 crores!
Rajagopal was furious that Sakshi was indulging in scurrilous writings against him. The reason for his latest outburst was a small write-up in the paper that the MP had caused insult to Ambedkar as he ate from a plate with the latter’s image and threw it into dustbin at a function.
While the news item was obviously mischievous, Rajagopal’s remarks were interesting. He said that he had already boycotted the paper in all his offices, as it was resorting to malicious writings against Congressmen. He felt that political parties should not be running media houses and declared that he would work for bringing out a bill to prohibit politicians from entering the media industry.
But what many people are not aware is that Rajagopal made substantial investment in Jagathi Publications when YSR was alive. M/s Jubilee Communications of Lagadapati Sridhar, younger brother of Rajagopal, invested Rs 20 crore in Carmel Asia Holdings Pvt Ltd, belonging to Jagan. Sridhar’s company did no business, excepting investing Rs 20 crore in Carmel. Sridhar also invested another Rs 30 crore in Jagathi Publications.
In August last, CBI had conducted searches on Sridhar’s offices and also questioned him over his investments. His name was later removed from the list of the suspects, as there was no evidence to prove that he was benefited by the YSR government in any way in return for his investment. The CBI could not but consider it as a pure investment.
Those in the know of the deal say that Lagadapati Rajagopal made the investment on the suggestion of late YSR without expecting any business favour immediately. Rajagopal wanted to be in the good books of YSR and Jagan during their hey days in pursuit of his political ambitions.
Luckily for him, the absence of the quid pro quo element in the deal saved him and his brother following the CBI inquiry. But the cost of his political ambition was about Rs 50 crore, since Rajagopal does not hope to get back his money any time in the future.
But the irony is that he is now planning to sue the paper for which he had put in so much money!
