NOTICE TO THE FAILE DHERO
Tax raids uncover Rs 35 crore in cash from Chiranjeevi’s daughter. Is the action intended to persuade him to work for Congress’s interests in the critical June 12 by- poll?
Thirty- five cardboard boxes containing a staggering Rs 35 crore, in bundles of crisp notes of Rs 500 and Rs 1,000. Another Rs 66 lakh in loose change and promissory notes worth about Rs 4 crore. That’s Rs 39.66 crore of unaccounted earnings discovered by Income Tax authorities at the Chennai home of actor Chiranjeevi’s elder daughter, Sushmita, 33.
Clearly, the raid was not an accident, nor was the timing. By- elections are due in one Lok Sabha seat and 18 Assembly seats on June 12. Though he merged his 30- month- old Praja Rajyam Party ( PRP) with the Congress in February 2011, the actor has become a non- performing asset for the party which is facing a possible rout from Y. S. Jaganmohan Reddy’s YSR Congress.
Chief Minister Kiran Kumar Reddy wanted Chiranjeevi to ask his popular actor brother Pawan Kalyan to campaign for the Congress, particularly in Tirupati, the Assembly seat the 56- year- old mega star vacated for the Rajya Sabha in April this year. Kalyan refused, saying he prefers to retain his independence.
Chiranjeevi has failed to deliver any of the advantages Congress expected of him. His rallies don’t draw crowds, and the influential Kapu community to which he belongs has drifted away. The Kapus, who matter in the deltaic coastal districts as well as Rayalaseema, are disappointed with the failure of Chiranjeevi to give them a party
POLICE AND ELECTION AUTHORITIES HAVE SEIZED RS 7.24 CRORE WITH FOUR WEEKS LEFT FOR POLLS.
on a par with the Reddys, who owe allegiance largely to the Congress, and the Kammas, who are Telugu Desam Party ( TDP) loyalists. They are drifting towards the YSR Congress and TDP.
Kapus see him as a failed hero, who has not lived up to the dream he showed them by launching PRP in 2008. Within a year of becoming MLAS, he and all others in the 18- strong PRP, except one, joined the Congress. They were promised and got sops, two posts of ministers in the state Cabinet and a Rajya Sabha seat for Chiranjeevi.
Could it be Congress’s way of reminding Chiranjeevi that he has to start performing? Sushmita’s husband, Vishnu Prasad, 33, told tax authorities that the cash is not his, but the manner in which it was tucked away neatly in their bedroom, and uncovered on the day Chiranjeevi was visiting Chennai, suggests Congress has resorted to some old- fashioned bullying.
Chiranjeevi has a large and rather colourful extended family. Sushmita, once engaged to actor Uday Kiran, married Prasad in 2006. Prasad’s family, led by his father LVR Sivaprasad, pioneered the import of palm oil into India and is involved in several businesses, including real estate.
“Acting on information, we carried out the search and seizure on a group associated with the granite, real estate, sugar and alcohol businesses based in Chennai,” said Sanjay V. Deshmukh, joint director, ( investigations), Income Tax, Tamil Nadu circle, in a press release. “We were told, at first, that it is part of the cash received from the sale, in October 2011, of a sugar factory in Chittoor district of Andhra Pradesh to a Chennai- based distilleries firm. But when its owners denied having paid cash, Arvind Nandagopal claimed that it was his unaccounted money kept in the bedroom of his brother- in- law Vishnu Prasad and that he was ready to pay tax,” an Income Tax department source told INDIA TODAY. “What we know for sure is that this is the second largest seizure of cash ever made in the country at one time— the highest, Rs 45 crore, was in Delhi in 2011,” adds the source.
There are several questions. Does the money belong to Nandagopal, 33, who is a businessman, and why did he choose to keep it with Prasad instead of at his own home? Or, was this huge sum part of the cash paid up during the sale of the sugar factory? Income Tax authorities will now register a case against Nandagopal.
Chiranjeevi has a history of doing cash deals for his films. The reputation has followed him into politics. Months after he floated PRP at Tirupati on August 26, 2008, in the run- up to the 2009 General Elections, aspirants alleged how they had paid huge sums only to be denied PRP tickets. Some protested outside the party headquarters in Hyderabad threatening to kill themselves, accusing both Chiranjeevi and his brother- in- law, producer Allu Aravind, 63, of selling party tickets.
Cash has been in circulation ever since elections were announced for June 12. Police and election authorities have seized Rs 7.24 crore with four weeks still to go for election day. Chiranjeevi needs a victory in Tirupati, as does Kiran Kumar Reddy— the temple town is in his district.
Congress’s opponents have another handle to beat the party with. “Chiranjeevi should volunteer for a CBI inquiry. We believe that this is the favour he got in return for merging PRP with the Congress,” says YSR Congress spokesperson Vasireddy Padma. Chiranjeevi is naturally trying to distance himself from the raids: “I have no connection whatsoever with the IT raids. I am a regular taxpayer with a blemish- free reputation and a recipient of the Samman Award given to meritorious taxpayers by the Income Tax Department,” he says. Andhra Pradesh Congress Committee President Botsa Satyanarayana is playing his part as chorus boy well. He insists Sushmita’s in- laws are rich and business- savvy.
It seems a far cry from the heady days of 2009 when PRP got 16.22 per cent of the votes polled. It could not, however, defeat the Congress which retained power, winning 156 of the 294 seats in the Andhra Pradesh Legislative Assembly. Chiranjeevi, however, can always take solace in his forthcoming project. He has been persuaded by Union minister Vayalar Ravi to act in his 150th movie with a social message. He has called in director V. V. Vinayak, who made his blockbuster Tagore, to firm a script. He plans to start shooting in September. Chiranjeevi’s son Ram Charan Teja, 27, has starred in four films in five years including the box office sensation Maghadheera, and is to marry Upasana Kamineni, a scion of the Apollo Hospitals group, in June.
If only politics had a happily ever after.