Bengaluru Flat Owner Says Tenants Rented the Place As They Wanted to Dump 'Office Stuff'

Bengaluru: The Karnataka Assembly elections witnessed high drama when in a midnight raid on an apartment flat in Bengaluru led to unearthing of nearly 10,000 voter IDs. The Congress and the BJP were quick to blame the other for this.

The flat in question, where the voter IDs were recovered, belongs to BJP leader Manjula Nanjamari, who says the flat was rented out, but not to Rakesh, the man Congress alleges is behind the fake voter ID scam.

The Congress alleges that the flat was rented out to BJP leader Rakesh and that he was a relative of the flat owner Manjula.

“Rakesh has no connection with this flat, yes he is my cousin though. Also, news that I have relations with Congress is false,” said Sridhar, son of Manjula Nanjamari.

Earlier today, addressing a press conference, Rakesh denied living at the flat.

“There is some distant relationship, but that is it. I do not live here, I live a kilometre away from that flat,” said Rakesh.

Manjula too confirmed that the flat was never rented to Rakesh.

“The tenants are Rangaraju and Rekha and not Rakesh. They took the place on rent on April 5 saying they just wanted place to dump some of their office stuff,” said Manjula Nanjamari, flat owner.

Manjula said the flat belonging to Rakesh was nothing but “fake news”.

Brandishing photographic evidence, Congress spokesperson Randeep Singh Surjewala tore into the BJP and said Rakesh was behind this.

"This is the BJP MLA candidate Muniraj Gowda with BJP leader Rakesh, in whose flat the voter IDs were recovered. Election Commission has clearly said that Manjula Nanjamari had rented the flat to her son Rakesh. BJP's lies stand exposed," said Surjewala.

Cementing his charge that Rakesh was indeed related to BJP, Surjewala also furnished the list of candidates who contested the BBMP election, which also had Rakesh’s name on it.

"This is the list of BJP candidates of BBMP Elections. On Sl. No 16 is the name Rakesh from Jalahalli ward. Is this not proof that Rakesh is in BJP?" asked Surjewala.

Surjewala also said that Manjula was a prominent leader of the BJP, but the party has now disowned her.

“Owner of the flat is Manjula Nanjamari, she was BJP corporator from '97-'02 & continues to be prominent leader of BJP. In last 24 hours she has been disowned by #Karnataka BJP in-charge Prakash Javadekar,” said Randeep Surjewala.

Rakesh maintains that he was the one who uncovered the fraud being committed.

“I had observed that there was suspicious activity going on here. I noticed that CCTVs had become defunct. I noticed that street-lights had been removed. There were a lot of outsiders who had been going and coming from that flat. I sent some of my boys to track this closely. They were able to catch glimpses of the cards and other activity through the window,” said Rakesh.