During the last one year of his regime between 2018 and 2019, Telugu Desam Party president and former Andhra Pradesh chief minister N Chandrababu Naidu had entered into open confrontation with the Narendra Modi government.
The confrontation went to such an extent that Naidu had even denied permission to the Central Bureau of Investigation to enter the state and investigate into the cases even against the all India service officials, apart from politicians.
Naidu had alleged that the Centre misused agencies like the CBI to target political opponents resulting in withdrawal of general consent to the agency.
But after the TDP lost power in 2019 elections, Naidu had taken a U-turn and started demanding CBI inquiries into every issue.
Meanwhile, chief minister Y S Jagan Mohan Reddy on June 6, 2019 reversed the November 8, 2018 order of the Naidu government which had restricted the operations of the agency in the state.
During the Naidu regime, as many as six cases which were supposed to be investigated by the CBI were referred to Anti-Corruption Bureau.
Now that the CBI is back in the state, it has taken over cases registered by the ACB related to central government departments.
Of them, two cases of alleged demand of bribe by officials of Income Tax department, another two pertaining to misappropriation of funds by Syndicate bank officials, and one each related to demand of bribe by officials of CGST department and Naval Dock Yard.
The CBI functions under the Delhi Special Police Establishment Act. Under Section 6 of the Act, a state government “routinely” grants consent to the CBI for exercising its authority in the state and the erstwhile Andhra Pradesh government under Naidu, too, had issued relevant orders periodically.
