Overview
- The Bengaluru special court approved anticipatory bail for Subhash Guttedar, his son Harsha, and aide Tipperudra, directing them to appear before the SIT within 10 days and to cooperate with the investigation.
- The order requires personal bonds of Rs 1 lakh each with a surety, bars contact with witnesses, and restricts foreign travel without court permission.
- The SIT says it seized a DVR and laptops, and a mirror image of the DVR allegedly shows materials being burned outside Guttedar’s Aland residence, with devices sent for forensic analysis.
- The case began with a February 21, 2023 FIR by EC officials after verification found 6,018 deletion applications in Aland, of which only 24 were genuine and 5,994 were residents.
- The SIT, formed on September 26 due to delays, has probed a Kalaburagi data centre alleged to have processed deletions at Rs 80 per entry; Guttedar denies wrongdoing, calling the burned items household trash from Deepavali cleaning.