Income Tax officials continued searches for the second day at almost all the locations that were surveyed in Coimbatore, Erode, Salem and the Nilgiris districts on Thursday.
The officials conducted searches at properties linked to V.K. Sasikala, the jailed former aide of late Chief Minister Jayalalithaa, in Kodanad near Kotagiri for the second successive day.
After completing the search at the Kodanad Estate and bungalow on Thursday, which belonged to Ms. Jayalalithaa, the team began its search in a nearby estate — the Green Tea Estate (also known as Curzon Estate). The search of the property, maintained and run by the management of the Kodanad Estate, continued on Friday, with the officials reviewing financial records at the estate till late in the evening.
An eight-member team of Income Tax officials entered the premises of Senthil Paper and Boards Private Limited at Ikkarai Thathapalli village in Sathyamangalam Taluk in Erode district for a search. The company is owned by sand baron O. Arumugasamy of Coimbatore. Workers were not allowed inside the company during the search operation.
The teams continued search of the premises of Mr. Arumugasamy of Senthil Group and of P.B. Sajeevan. Sources said there seemed to be more thrust to the searches on the premises of Mr. Arumugasamy at Ramnagar.
In Namakkal, the search continued for the second day at the residence of S. Senthil, a member of the advocates team that appeared for Jayalalithaa and Sasikala in the disproportionate assets case. The officials took Lavanya, sister of Mr. Senthil, to the bank and searched the lockers of the family members. The team returned with bags containing documents.
( with inputs from Rohan Premkumar, M. Soundariya Preetha, S.P. Saravanan, and Syed Muthahar Saqaf )
