Ten years after he hit headlines upon his arrest by the DRI for his failure to declared valuables — including four diamond-studded watches and foreign currency — collectively worth Rs 47 lakh — at the Mumbai airport on his return from aboard, Pune’s top businessman Avinash Bhosale landed in trouble once again on Friday, as the Income Tax (I-T) officials raided his house and that of his son-in-law and Youth Congress leader Vishwajeet Kadam in Pune city and suburbs.
In a development that took him, his family members and business associates by surprise, a team of IT officials from Mumbai carried out massive searches at the offices and residences of Bhosale and Vishwajeet who incidentally is the son of senior State Congress leader and former Minister Patangrao Kadam.
Among other places, the searches were carried out at Bhosale’s company headquarters, ABIl Group at Ganeshkhind near the Pune University campus, his home at Baner, Vishwajeet’s residence at Sinhgad and his office in Pune. The reasons for simultaneous raid on the premises of Bhosale and his son-in-law Vishwajeet were not immediately known. From being a “petty works contractor” in 1979, Bhosale has come a long way to own a builder's firm, with an annual turnover of several hundred crores. A man with very expensive tastes and a luxurious lifestyle, Bhosale owns 30,000 sq-ft palatial bungalow spread over 12 acres of land and a leading hotel, besides having at his disposal one helicopter and a fleet of foreign cars.
Bhosale is known to be magnanimous, when it comes to either making available his helicopter, his fleet of vehicles or extending hospitality to powers-that-be. Having been close to politicians of different hues over the years, Bhosale enjoys considerable clout in the state political circles.