Election Commission calls CBDT chairman, Revenue Secretary to discuss Income Tax raids

The EC has called Revenue Secretary and CBDT Chairman to explain the raids amid Congress` claims that enforcement agencies are being used by BJP to target the party ahead of the poll.

The Election Commission (EC) has called the revenue secretary and chairman, Central Board of Direct Taxes on Tuesday to hold discussions over the raids by Income Tax (I-T) department in Madhya Pradesh and some other parts of India.

PTI reported that the EC has called Revenue Secretary A B Pandey and CBDT Chairman P C Mody to explain the raids amid Congress' claims that enforcement agencies are being used by BJP to target the party ahead of the Lok Sabha poll.

On Sunday, the EC had "strongly advised" the Finance Ministry that any action taken by enforcement agencies during election time should be "neutral" and "non-discriminatory". The EC had also advised the Ministry to keep in loop the officials of the poll panel about such actions.

The advice was issued by the EC following the I-T raids in Madhya Pradesh Sunday and in Karnataka, Tamil Nadu and Andhra Pradesh in the recent past on opposition leaders and their associates.people connected to them.

On Monday, the I-T department had said that it had unearthed a "widespread and well-organised" racket of collection of unaccounted cash of about Rs 281 crore after conducting raids against some close aides of Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath.

Sources told PTI that I-T officials have succeeded in recovering Rs 14.6 crore of "unaccounted" cash and seized diaries and computer files exposing dubious payments made between Madhya Pradesh and Delhi.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) said on Monday that a trail of Rs 20 crore suspect cash was also found by I-T and this money was allegedly moved to the "headquarters of a major political party in Delhi".

Meanwhile, the I-T raids continued on Tuesday morning at the residence of Ashwin Sharma, an associate of Praveen Kakkar, who is officer on special duty (OSD) to Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Kamal Nath. Sources said that over Rs 10 crore cash and some documents have been recovered by I-T sleuths from Sharma's residence. Sharma is the manager of a non-government organisation.