Raids on Sasikala, Jaya TV: Income Tax Dept recovers undisclosed wealth around Rs.1430 Cr

NewsBharati    14-Nov-2017
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Chennai, November 14: Income Tax department disclosed the unaccounted wealth of around Rs. 1430 Crores during the raids that rocked on the premises of jailed AIADMK leader VK Sasikala and their business associates, and premises of Jaya TV. 

On November 9, Income Tax sleuths raided 187 premises across multiple cities, mostly in Tamil Nadu. The I-T department conducted raids on the Sasikala clan and premises of Jaya TV, who’s CEO and Managing Director Vivek Jayaraman is the nephew of the AIADMK leader last week. The places raided included the residence of Sasikala's husband M. Natarajan in Thanjavur, Kodanad Tea Estate belonging to Jayalalithaa, Jazz Cinemas, Midas Distilleries, Sharada Paper and Boards, Senthil Group of Companies, Nilgiri Furniture in Coimbatore, Jaya TV, Namadhu MGR and several other premises in Tamil Nadu, Puducherry, Hyderabad, and Bengaluru.

"We have found tax evasion of Rs 1,430 crore, as of now. This figure is likely to go up as we have also seized incriminating documents. We have seized Rs 7 crore in cash, and gold jewellery worth around Rs 5 Crore," said the senior tax official. A lot of diamonds seized have to be evaluated. We have also frozen 15 bank lockers and several bank accounts, official added.

All the premises were linked either to Sasikala, her nephew TTV Dhinakaran or Jaya TV. The raids were carried out over suspected tax evasion, sources said. The search operations resumed on Monday after it were temporarily called off on Sunday.

Further he said that the department waited for individuals and companies associated with Sasikala to file their tax returns for the last fiscal, adding that searches were carried out to detect tax evasion based on the filings and the data with the Income Tax Department. The official said that tax demand would be raised after analysing the documents and obtaining clarifications.

Sasikala, is currently serving a jail sentence after conviction for corruption. The searches were conducted in connection with unexplained routing of cash post-demonetisation through shell companies allegedly connected to Sasikala and her nephew T.T.V. Dinakaran, who heads one of the factions of the ruling AIADMK.