Madhya Pradesh IT Raids: Income Tax sleuths came as tourists, even state intelligence had no idea

The Income Tax Department on Monday said it has detected a "widespread and well-organised racket" of collection of unaccounted cash of about Rs 281 crore through various persons in different walks of life, including business, politics and public service. Income tax sleuths had reportedly planned the raids three days in advance and went to Bhopal as tourists to ditch the local authorities and state intelligence agencies. The IT department officers hired a tourist cab and went directly to the pre-decided places without informing local administration.

Those searched included Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath's 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 a company of his nephew Ratul Puri.

Even though the Income Tax Department (ITD) claim to have recovered huge cash, MP chief minister’s former OSD Pravin Kakkar refuted the claims and said the ITD officers didn’t find anything objectionable. He termed the entire operation politically motivated.

“Despite the 2-day long raid they didn't find any document that they could seize, they didn't recover any cash or jewelry either. They didn't find anything objectionable, it was a political operation,” news agency ANI quoted Kakkar as saying.

Reacting to the development, Chief Minister Kamal Nath said that the Narendra Modi government was using constitutional institutions to threaten political opponents.

“The entire country knows how the constitutional institutions were used and against whom they were used during the past five years. 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,” Nath said.