The income tax department raided the house of DMK leader Kanimozhi in Tamil Nadu’s Thoothukudi on Tuesday evening. I-T department sources said the raids are being conducted at Kanimozhi’s house in Kurinji Nagar area of Thoothukudi.
Kanimozhi is contesting from Thoothukudi Lok Sabha seat against state BJP chief Tamilsai Soundararajan. All the 39 seats of Tamil Nadu go to polls on April 18. Kanimozhi is the sister of DMK chief MK Stalin.
“The Election Commission is playing a sick joke on the people of Tamil Nadu,” DMK spokesperson A Saravanan told NDTV.
On Sunday night, the Income Tax department and the Election Commission’s flying squad raided the room of Tamil Nadu Revenue Minister, RB Udayakumar at the MLAs’ hostel in Chennai following a tip off that huge amount of cash was being kept there for distribution among voters, but drew a blank. Last week, the I-T department carried out searches on multiple premises belonging to a construction firm and two financiers in Chennai, Namakkal and Tirunelveli.
I-T raids at the premises of close aides of Madhya Pradesh chief minister Kamal Nath created a huge political controversy last week. The Election Commission held a meeting with Revenue secretary Ajay Bhushan Pandey and Central Board of direct Taxes (CBDT) chairman Pramod Chandra Mody after allegations by opposition parties that recent raids are politically motivated and are being conducted at the behest of the BJP government.
In the past few weeks, raids have also been conducted in Karnataka, Andhra Pradesh, Maharashtra and Tamil Nadu.