Letter on gutka scam found from Sasikala’s room in Poes Garden
CHENNAI: The Income Tax department has told Madras high court that its confidential letter seeking action against those involved in the gutka scam in Tamil Nadu was seized from a room occupied by expelled AIADMK leader Sasikala in the Poes Garden residence of Jayalalithaa.
This information was disclosed in an affidavit submitted on Friday by Principal Director of Income Tax, Chennai, Susie Babu Varghese on a PIL filed by DMK MLA J Anbazhagan for a CBI probe into the alleged scam.
Alleging that a state minister and high-level state and central government officers, including police officials, were involved in the scam to “facilitate” sale of banned ‘gutka’ (tobacco product), the PIL contended that the CBI can conduct a thorough and impartial probe into the matter.
According to the affidavit, the then principal director of the I-T department had on August 11, 2016 written a letter to the Tamil Nadu chief secretary and the Director General of Police in connection with the scam.
The letter was addressed to both of them, with copies of the relevant accounts from the seized materials, it said.
Copies of extracts of sworn statements recorded from Madhava Rao, a partner in the gutka firm allegedly involved in the scam, evidencing payment to various parties connected with the state government, were also enclosed with the letter.
The letter had requested necessary action against the persons concerned, Varghese said in the affidavit. It further said that during a search conducted by the (I-T) department in November 2017 in the rooms occupied by Sasikala in Veda Nilayam, a note dated September 2, 2016 and signed by the then DGP addressed to the then CM (Jayalalithaa) enclosing copies of the confidential I-T letter was found and seized.