Rajaratnam's brother loses bid to dismiss insider trading charges

NEW YORK, April 18 (Reuters) - Rengan Rajaratnam, the younger brother of imprisoned hedge fund manager Raj Rajaratnam, on Friday lost a bid to dismiss some of the insider trading charges leveled against him last year.

U.S. District Judge Naomi Reice Buchwald in Manhattan ruled that the indictment adequately alleged the essential elements of the crimes charged.

Buchwald agreed that four securities fraud counts were "internally inconsistent" with a conspiracy charge contained in the indictment. But she withheld ruling on whether to dismiss them in order to allow the government to decide whether to proceed on those charges.

(Reporting by Nate Raymond in New York; Editing by Leslie Adler)