The Income Tax Department sleuths on April 8 said that it has detected a “widespread and well-organised” racket involving unaccounted assets of about Rs 281 crore in Madhya Pradesh. This came almost 48 hours after a massive crackdown on Chief Minister Kamal Nath’s aides and two others in Madhya Pradesh.
IT raids across 50 locations
The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) said that the IT sleuths have also discovered a trail of Rs 20 crore suspect cash which is allegedly being moved through Hawala to the “headquarters of a major political party in Delhi,” reported The Times Of India.
The Election commission had asked investigative agencies to inform it before undertaking any such exercise. “The Election Commission strongly advises that all enforcement actions during the election period, even when conducted ruthlessly with a view to curb the blatant electoral malpractice (of using money power to influence voter behaviour), be absolutely neutral, impartial and non-discriminatory,” read a letter that was written to the investigative bodies by the EC. The CBDT said in a statement, “Rs 14.6 crore of unaccounted cash has been found so far, besides 252 bottles of liquor, a few arms and tiger hide-skins.”
The statement by CBDT adds that records of collection and disbursement of cash in the form of written diaries, excel sheets and computer docs were found and retrieved from the locations. Moreover, searches in Delhi involving close relative of the senior functionary has led to the seizure of evidence, cash book recording unaccounted transactions of Rs 230 crore, syphoning off money through bogus billing of more than Rs 242 crore among others. Moreover, several benami properties at posh locations in Delhi have also been detected.
The IT department on Sunday launched pre-dawn raids at 52 locations of four states. They were probing people linked to CM Nath. Those who were searched included Nath’s former Officer on Special Duty (OSD) Pravin Kakkar, former adviser Rajendra Miglani and Ashwani Sharma among others.
Pravin Kakkar told NDTV, “At around 3.30 am tax officials from Delhi broke into my house…the searches went on till very late…searches were carried out at home and in the office…they checked the two bank lockers also but did not find anything incriminating. I think the actions are politically motivated.”
BJP national general secretary Kailash Vijayvargiya said, “This has made one thing clear that those who are thieves have complaints against the watchman.”
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