Price Waterhouse partners sent to police custody

HYDERABAD: A magistrate court on Tuesday dismissed the bail applications of auditor Price Waterhouse's partners S Gopalakrishnan and Srinivas Talluri, while sending the two to police custody for two days from tomorrow.

While rejecting the bail application, the 6th additional chief metropolitan magistrate directed the CID officials, investigating the Rs 7,800 crore fraud in Satyam Computers, to take custody of the duo from tomorrow at 1030 hrs and produce them before him at 1600 hrs on Thursday.

Price Waterhouse, which had earlier suspended the two partners, in a statement disputed the public prosecutor's claim that Gopalakrishnan and Talluri were not partners of PW Bangalore and that they knowingly misrepresented their affiliation.

"Contrary to this allegation, Gopalakrishnan and Talluri are in fact partners of Price Waterhouse Bangalore... PW has a branch established in Hyderabad... are appropriately registered with the Institute of Chartered Accountants of India," PW said in the statement.

The auditor also said that the two have strongly rebutted the prosecution's allegations that they engaged in criminal conduct in relation to their work on Satyam Computer, whose founder Ramalinga Raju last month disclosed a massive accounting fraud in the company.

Raju too is in judicial custody awaiting charges to be filed.

The CID officials had filed a petition seeking five days custody of the two PW partners for interrogation in the case. However, the court allowed two days police custody.

Gopalakrishnan and Talluri are lodged in Chanchalguda central prison here.