VIJAYAWADA: The House Committee, constituted to probe into allegations of ‘data theft and illegal transmission, causing infringement of citizens’ rights during 2016-19’, tabled its interim report in the Assembly on Tuesday.“There appears to be unauthorised and improper transmission of large amounts of sensitive data from the State Data Centre (APSDC) to unknown external servers between November 30, 2018 and March 30, 2019,” the panel concluded in its report.
Panel chairman and Tirupati MLA Bhumana Karunakar Reddy said, “It is 100 per cent a fact that data was stolen from the State data centre during the TDP’s tenure. The panel will initiate an in-depth enquiry to book those involved.”
The Assembly had constituted the House Committee after West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee alleged that the previous N Chandrababu Naidu-led TDP government had purchased the controversial Pegasus spyware.
Six MLAs — five from YSRC and one from TDP are members of the committee. Opposition party member Maddali Giridhar Rao, now in favour of YSRC, is representing the TDP. The Committee has met four times and discussed with heads of several departments before arriving to the conclusion, Karunakar Reddy said and explained, “We have identified that the previous TDP government stole data between 2017 and 2019, particularly in the election year (2018-19). Using the Seva Mitra mobile app, the party attempted to delete over 30 lakh voters, who did not appear to be in favour of the TDP, from the voters.”
Meanwhile, TDP MLAs expressed ire as they did not receive the report. Stating that the TDP leaders were misleading the House and degrading the Chair, YSRC MLA G Srikanth Reddy said it was mentioned in the House Committee rule position that two photocopies of the report were placed at the Secretary table.