Naidu demands the release of senior jounalist Ankababu

Veteran journalist was taken into custody at 6.30 pm

Family was not informed of the reason for arrest

TDP leaders, APUWJ condemn the action

Veteran journalist Kollu Ankababu was arrested on Thursday at Vijayawada by the CID police. 73 year old ailing journalist was questioned at Guntur CID office and then brought to Vijayawada office  late in the night. He was taken into custody at 6.30 pm. Ankababu’s wife Vijaya wanted to know why her husband was being arrested. But the police did not care to give her proper reply. Eight police personnel, including one women, in civil dress visited the residence of the scribe and insisted that he should follow them.

Official sources say the journalist was arrested as he forwarded a news item regarding confiscation of gold from a woman passenger who was travelling from Dubai at Gannavaram airport. The lady was rumoured to be a wife of an IAS officer. Ankababu had forwarded a news item that was sent to his mobile by someone.

Arresting an elderly person at night time is against the Supreme Court orders, his lawyer Sridhar Thota said. Nara Chandrababu Naidu, chief of TDP and former chief minister, condemned the arrest and wrote a letter to the DGP asking him to release the senior journalist without further delay. TDP’s national general secretary Nara Lokesh and polit bureau member Varla Ramaiah criticised the government for arresting a senior scribe on flimsy grounds. APUWJ, a working journalist body, also appealed to the YSRCP government to release Ankababu at least on health grounds. The senior journalist is a diabetic. He has several health issues.

Ankababu started his career with Eenadu and ended with Udayam as chief of its Vijayawada bureau. He also worked for HMTV from  Vijayawada for some time. He has been actively involved in journalistic activities even after his retirement on the closure of Udayam in 1995.

Ankababu son Ranjan lives in Boston and daughter in Washington DC in the US.

Advocates at Vijayawada are confident that Ankababu will be granted bail on Friday. They said it was a frivolous case and he should not have been arrested in the first place.