Major breakthrough: Tirumala TTD employee apprehended in laddu ghee contamination case

Tirupati: The Supreme Court-appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) has arrested a serving official of Tirumala Tirupati Devasthanam (TTD) in the ongoing laddu prasadam ghee adulteration case.

The SIT, led by the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI), took senior TTD Engineering Department official RSSVR Subrahmanyam into custody. Subrahmanyam, who previously served as TTD General Manager (Procurement), was responsible for procuring key materials, including the ghee used in laddu preparation, said SIT member and Guntur Range IG Sarvasresti Tripathi.

Subrahmanyam was produced before the ACB Court, which remanded him in judicial custody for 15 days. He is the 29th accused in the case and the first serving TTD official to be arrested. To date, nine individuals have been held in connection with the scam.

The SIT investigation revealed that Subrahmanyam, as part of the technical team inspecting ghee manufacturing units, allegedly issued quality certificates in exchange for bribes from private suppliers. His arrest followed statements from other accused, which exposed a nexus between TTD’s marketing wing and private dairy owners.

The SIT has also questioned former TTD chairman and YSR Congress Parliamentary Party leader YV Subba Reddy, during whose tenure adulterated ghee was allegedly supplied, and former TTD executive officer AV Dharma Reddy regarding lapses in ghee procurement, supplier verification and quality control. Investigators probed how Bhole Baba Dairy, blacklisted by TTD in 2022, continued supplying ghee through proxy firms.

According to the SIT, between 2019 and 2024, around 20 crore laddus were made using adulterated ghee, including palm oil, palm kernel oil and other chemical additives, accounting for nearly 40% of the total 48.76 crore laddus produced in that period. The investigation also revealed that Bhole Baba Organic Dairy of Uttarakhand, which reportedly never procured milk or butter, supplied 68 lakh kg of spurious ghee, valued at ₹250 crore, through proxies including Vyshnavi Dairy (Nellore), Mal Ganga Dairy (Maharashtra) and AR Dairy (Tamil Nadu).

Earlier, the SIT arrested Ajay Kumar Sugandh, who allegedly supplied chemicals to Bhole Baba Dairy, and K Chinna Appanna, former personal assistant to Subba Reddy, who allegedly played a key role in awarding contracts to ineligible dairies.

The laddu scam came to light after the Telugu Desam Party-led government took office in June 2024. Initially, a state-appointed SIT was formed in September 2024, but the Supreme Court in October 2024 ordered a new, independent five-member SIT, including two CBI officers, two senior Andhra Pradesh police officers, and one official from the Food Safety and Standards Authority of India (FSSAI).

IANS