Hyderabad: A city sessions court in Hyderabad has rejected businessman Satish Vuppalapati and his wife Shilpa’s anticipatory bail plea in an alleged 23 crore investment fraud, citing the nature and gravity of the charges.The Central Crime Station (CCS) of Hyderabad registered the case on Sept 18 following a complaint by surgical gastroenterologist Dr P Vinay Kumar, son of former Union minister P Shiva Shankar, who alleged that he and two others were cheated. The accused, who escaped task force police custody after being picked up from Mumbai last week, had applied for anticipatory bail on Oct 15, which the Nampally sessions court dismissed on Oct 30.Opposing the plea, additional public prosecutor A Ram Reddy alleged that between 2019 and 2022, the couple, along with late real estate promoter Prasen Kumar Puvvala, persuaded Dr Kumar, his relatives and two other investors to channel money into Vijay Sravya Infra & Developers and Naskon Associates LLP, promising handsome returns. Dr Kumar alone transferred 15.21 crore, while two others put in 7.89 crore, but payouts ceased in Jan 2023.According to police, the funds were routed through at least nine shell entities allegedly controlled by Satish and Prasen. Prasen, who reportedly admitted to Dr Kumar about diverting the funds, died under suspicious circumstances in April 2023, while Naskon Associates was subsequently renamed twice in a deliberate attempt to obliterate the money trail.The prosecution also flagged an enforcement directorate case (ECIR/HYZO/07/2018) probing a separate 3,003 crore loan-laundering fraud, in which Satish is the prime accused and Shilpa a suspect, as well as an ongoing GST evasion inquiry.Defence counsel M Venkateshwar Rao maintained that the applicants never managed Vijay Sravya Infra, noting that Shilpa’s four-month stint as interim director ended in Sept 2021. He argued that no deposit under the Telangana Protection of Depositors of Financial Establishments Act was involved, and pointed out that the complaint was lodged after an unexplained delay.“As submitted by the prosecution, the case is under investigation to collect oral and documentary evidence, list of companies associated with the accused, details of bank accounts and statements, income tax returns, and funds received from the victims. Moreover, since the date of offence, both the accused are absconding. Considering the nature and gravity of the offence, I am of the considered opinion that it is not a fit case to grant anticipatory bail to the petitioners at this stage,” the court said while dismissing the anticipatory bail plea.The CCS police said Satish and Shilpa are still on the run, and that their teams are searching for them in Maharashtra and Gujarat.
