CHENNAI:
Income tax officials raided 45 premises belonging to former state power and excise minister Natham R Viswanathan, Chennai mayor
Saidai Duraisamy
‘s son Vetri Duraisamy, Kirthilal Jewellers and
Meenakshi Mission Hospital
group on Monday. The premises are spread over Tamil Nadu, Andhra Pradesh, Mumbai and Delhi.
“Following a tip off about acquisition of wealth beyond known sources of income, teams of officials from the Income Tax investigation wing raided residences and offices of Viswanathan in Chennai, Madurai and Dindigul,” a senior I-T official told TOI. The raids began in the morning and continued well past evening.
A few hours after the raids began at Viswanathan’s establishments,
AIADMK chief
J Jayalalithaa removed him from all party posts.
“Viswanathan has also been removed from the posts of organising secretary and party spokesperson,” Jayalalithaa said in a brief statement, without detailing the charges. Viswanathan lost the assembly polls in May in Athoor constituency. However, the party high command made him organising secretary and party spokesperson in June.
Viswanathan’s reputation came under a cloud on the eve of assembly elections this year. C P Anbunathan, a businessman said to be close to Viswanathan, was caught with loads of cash at his residence near Karur by
Election Commission and I-T officials. An ambulance with a currency-counting machine was also seized. Cases were filed against Anbunathan and are pending. There were allegations against Viswanathan regarding power projects when he was in-charge of the ministry.
I-T teams raided the house of
Vetri Doraisamy
at Tambaram. “Vetri is the director or partner of many companies which deal in energy-related equipment and marine products. The department received reliable information about Vetri’s business activities and our teams raided his residence in
Tambaram
,” said the official.
Raids were also carried out on a Coimbatore-based diamond jeweller. “The raids were carried out in Chennai, Coimbatore and a few other places. The officials raided a shop of the jeweller on C P Ramasamy Road here and on Rajaveedi, Cross Cut Road and the jeweller’s diamond workshop at Tudiyalur in Coimbatore,” he said.
In Madurai, raids were carried out in the hospital owners’ houses. “The raids were conducted in the houses of hospital chief N Sethuraman and his son S Gururmurthy. Some documents and floating assets were seized from the premises raided today. The total value and the nature of documents seized will be evaluated in the coming days,” said the official.
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