Indore (MP): After two days of Income-Tax (I-T) raid, Praveen Kakkar (former OSD to Madhya Pradesh CM Kamal Nath) claimed the raid was a political act and despite a 2-day long operation the tax sleuths did not find any unaccounted document that they could seize nor recover any cash or jewellery from his residence.
Kakkar informed that I-T officials did not find anything objectionable.
The Income-Tax Department raids against close aides of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath and others with search teams making seizures of documents and cash, officials said.
Officials said the searches were made on charges of alleged tax evasion and hawala transactions during the ongoing poll season, are continuing at various premises in Bhopal, Indore and in Delhi and
While there is no official word on the exact amount of cash seized, sources said over Rs 10 crore suspected cash has been seized till now.
At least half-a-dozen people, linked to alleged hawala dealer Paras Mal Lodha, were questioned by the department.
The department had launched pre-dawn raids at 52 locations on Sunday on people and associates linked to Nath.
Sources had told that there is a "strong possibility" of the cash recovered during the operation being used as an election inducement to fund political campaigns and bribe voters in the poll-bound state and in Delhi.
A preliminary report of the raids was also shared by the department with the Central Board of Direct Taxes and the Election Commission in Delhi.
READ: Kanhaiya kumar addresses public rally in Ujarpur
A cash van with large-sized trunks has been sent by the department at a location in Bhopal to seize and collect the cash found during the raids, they said.
Those searched included Nath's former Officer on Special Duty (OSD) Pravin Kakkar, former adviser Rajendra Miglani, Ashwani Sharma and executives linked to his brother-in-law's firm Moser Bayer and his nephew Ratul Puri's company.
Nath had reacted late Sunday to the development.
"The situation about the I-T raids is not clear yet. It would be appropriate to speak on this after the situation is clear. But the entire country knows how the constitutional institutions were used and against whom they were used during the past five years," he had said.
"These institutions were used to scare people. When they do not have anything to say on development and their work, they used this kind of tactics against their opponents," the CM's statement had said.
READ: Players' Association for cricketers within 2 weeks: CoA
