In an unprecedented and unheard of incident in Tamil Nadu, the office, residence and business premises of P Ram Mohana Rao, the State’s Chief Secretary, was raided by the sleuths of the Department of Income Tax. Rao will go down in Tamil Nadu history as the first top bureaucrat in the State who had to face the ignominy of tax sleuths raiding his residence and office.
Though the Income Tax department is yet to issue any communique about the raids on Rao, a 1985 batch officer who was appointed as Chief Secretary of the State in June 2016, tax sleuths swooped down in 13 places spread across Chennai, Chittoor and Bangalore. Tax men also raided the Thiruvanmiyoor residence of Vivek, the son of the Chief Secretary.
By 2 pm, the tax officials, accompanied by the CRPF commandoes, raided the office chamber of Rao in Fort Saint George, Tamil Nadu Secretariat in Chennai.
Surprisingly, Chief Minister Panneerselvam was presiding over a meeting of senior officials in the adjoining chamber while tax men were examining the Chief Secretary’s cabin.
The Wednesday raids were a fallout of the indiscriminating documents seized by the IT team which raided the residences and business premises of Shekhar Reddy, a Chennai based mining baron. Reddy and his associate Srinivasulu were arrested by the CBI on Wednesday on charges of amassing assets disproportionate to their known sources of income. The tax men had seized cash worth `133 crore and 135 kg gold from the raids held in Reddy’s residence and offices last week.
Sources in the Income Tax Department said that the documents seized by the IT team from Sekhar Reddy’s residence and business premises led them to Rao. Before his appointment as Chief Secretary, Rao had held many senior places in Tamil Nadu.
This Andhra Pradesh-born officer was to retire from Government service in 2017 September. He was appointed Chief Secretary of Tamil Nadu Government by shunting out then Chief Secretary K Gnanadesikan as the CMD of Tamil Nadu Industrial Development Corporation.
MK Stalin, the leader of the Opposition in Tamil Nadu legislative Assembly, said here that Chief Minister Panneerselvam should come out with a statement on the raids being held at the residences and office of Chief Secretary Rao. He said this kind of raid was unheard of in Tamil Nadu.
TKS Elangovan MP and spokesman of the DMK said there was nothing unusual in the raids on Rao. “He was a wheeler-dealer for the former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa. It is known that his appointment as Chief Secretary itself was a gift by the then Chief Minister for favours received from him,” said Elangovan.
Union Minister Nirmala Seetharaman said the raids were a routine thing done by the various investigation departments under the Government. “Bodies like the Enforcement Directorate investigate issues which they come across and these raids are part of such investigations,” she told reporters at Madurai.