Income Tax raids on 'Samajwadi perfume' maker Pushpraj Jain

The Income Tax Department on Friday raided the premises on Samajwadi Party MLC and perfume baron Pushpraj Jain 'Pampi' in Uttar Pradesh's Kannuaj while simultaneously carrying out similar operations in several other cities.

Kannauj (UP): The Income Tax Department on Friday raided the premises on Samajwadi Party MLC and perfume baron Pushpraj Jain 'Pampi' in Uttar Pradesh's Kannuaj while simultaneously carrying out similar operations in several cities in India.

The raids follow ones carried out by Director General of GST Intelligence (DGGI) in Uttar Pradesh in the last week in which it had unearthed crores in the house of businessman Piyush Jain even as the opposition had alleged the operation was a case of 'mistaken identity' since Piyush and Pushpraj carried the same last name, were in the same business, and lived in the same city.

On Friday morning, a series of raids, according to sources, were simultaneously conducted by the Income Tax department at the residence of Pushpraj Jain, another perfume trader in the city, as well as other locations in Kanpur, Bombay, Surat, and Dindigul (Tamil Nadu).

Pushpraj Jain, who deals in the perfumery compounds business and had recently launched Samajwadi Perfume, is considered a close accomplice to SP's Akhilesh Yadav.

Akhilesh is scheduled to hold a press conference at the SP office in Kannauj, amid concerns over this raid at the MLC's premises.

As soon as the news of the I-T raid spread, a number of SP workers gathered outside Jain's house.

The party also reacted to the fresh raids on Twitter again implying that the raids and subsequent arrest of Piyush Jain earlier this week was a case of 'mistaken identity'.

"After a huge failure last time, this time BJP's ultimate ally IT (income Tax Department) has finally raided the place of SP MLC Shri Pushp Raj Jain and other perfume traders of Kannauj. Openly misuse of central agencies by scared BJP is common in UP elections. People are watching everything, they will answer by vote," SP tweeted.

DGGI, however, have junked the 'mistaken identity' theory.

The GST Intelligence Unit headed by Director General (DGGI) has been raiding the properties of several businessmen in Kanpur since last week.

After the confiscation of crores worth of cash and jewelry from the Kanpur perfume trader Piyush Jain, the team had also recently raided businessman Sunil Gupta's property. This is consecutively the third raid in the state since last week.