Raju gets ‘physical’; shows mind for matter

Express News Service 30 Apr 2009
HYDERABAD: In the sweltering heat, a few men were sitting on a bench outside the court hall here at a local court, waiting patiently for their turn to appear before the magistrate.

While one was engaged in an animated discussion on the electoral fortunes of a TRS candidate, another, a bespectacled ‘gentleman,’ was absorbed in Isaac Asimov’s Understanding Physics.

The remaining appeared only too happy to talk to their family members. The man talking politics was once the chief financial officer of Satyam, Vadlamani Srinivas and the TRS candidate in question is his college-mate. As for the science buff, he is none other than B Ramalinga Raju, main accused in the Satyam fraud case.

As the clock inched towards 11.45 a.m., the newly-appointed XIV Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate, K Sudhakar, who assumed charge this morning, summoned them and a head count was taken of all the nine men – Ramalinga Raju, B Ramaraju, Vadlamani Srinivas, auditors S Gopalkrishnan, Talluri Srinivas, Satyam’s former vice-president G Ramakrishna, senior manager D Venkatapathy Raju, Ch Srisailam and B Suryanarayana Raju.

‘‘Where were you sir?’’ the magistrate asked Ramalinga Raju and pat came the reply, ‘‘jail’’ from the man who was till then using his criminal brain to comprehend the laws of the universe. ‘‘And, you sir?’’ the magistrate turned to B Suryanarayana Raju, another accused.

‘‘On bail,’’ he replied.

Unlike in the past, this time, the accused were more vocal and without inhibitions, talking freely with their counsels and family members.

Ramalinga Raju was seen talking to his brother Suryanarayana and also taking some points on a note pad.

During his last visit to the court, Ramalinga Raju was found reading H G Wells’ History of the World. It was a sequel to the Outline of History, published in 1920 and perhaps, the first general history constructed on an evolutionary, sociological and anthropological basis.