A marathon search-and-seizure operation by the Income Tax Department against Karnataka’s Energy Minister D.K. Shivakumar and firms allegedly linked to him, which concluded on Saturday, has led to the unearthing of alleged undisclosed income of nearly ₹300 crore, apart from cash and jewellery worth nearly ₹15 crore, sources in the department said.
However, there is no clarity on what portion of these recoveries was directly related to the Minister and made from premises owned by him. Several real estate, transport and jewellery firms were searched on the suspicion that they had links with the Minister.
The sources had earlier claimed that they had recovered a cash trove of ₹8 crore from the Minister’s Safdarjung Road residence in Delhi.
Minutes after the raids on his Sadashivanagar residence concluded, Mr. Shivakumar said that he would not comment on the search and recoveries, but added that he would “answer all questions after I get copies of panchanamas of searches at my premises”.
Sources in the department said that the Minister, who was cooperating with the officials till the end of the search operations, refused to answer several questions during the final round of interrogation on Friday night.
The Minister, sources said, answered only questions pertaining to recoveries from his premises and refused to answer those pertaining to any documents recovered from the premises not owned by him, including his father-in-law’s house.
The vast search operations on over 64 premises, which started on Wednesday, concluded on Saturday morning after over 78 hours. Search operations at various other locations, including the Minister’s father-in-law Thimmaiah’s residence in Mysuru, drew to an end a few hours later.
