Kanpur chemical manufacturer Piyush Jain, from whose properties tax officials have allegedly seized a cumulative Rs 180 crore in currency notes, 25kg gold and 250kg silver as raids continued for the third day, was on Monday remanded in 14 days’ judicial custody.
The arrest of Jain late on Sunday and the raids have triggered a political slugfest in poll-bound Uttar Pradesh with both the BJP and the Samajwadi Party alleging that the businessman was linked to the other.
Jain has been charged by the Directorate General of GST (Intelligence), Ahmedabad in Gujarat, and the income tax department in Kanpur with money laundering, theft of goods and services tax and income tax, and cheating.
The case against him has been filed at Kanpur’s Kakadev police station.
The joint teams of the two departments are said to have seized Rs 180 crore in unaccounted cash, calculated with the help of eight currency-counting machines, from his establishments at Kanpur and Kannauj, in addition to gold and silver.
The seized wealth has been deposited at the Kanpur main branch of the State Bank of India. Jain was on Sunday night taken to Kakadev police station, where he slept on a bed of blankets on the floor.
Chief minister Yogi Adityanath seemed to suggest that Jain is associated with the Samajwadi Party. “Raids conducted on a person associated with the SP have made it clear how some people minted money during the five years of its rule. Over Rs 257 crore and several kilograms of gold and silver have been recovered from him,” he told a rally in Kaushambi on Sunday. “Crore of rupees were embezzled by the previous government. They are being recovered now.”
Samajwadi leader Anurag Bhadauria claimed that Jain was associated with the BJP. “He has friends in the BJP,” Bhadauria said.
Sources close to Jain said he was a manufacturer of essence for pan masala.
“Jain used to supply essence to pan masala companies through middlemen who are politicians from two parties. Recently, Jain had started supplying essence to pan masala makers directly. This angered the middlemen-politicians who gave a tip off to the Goods and Services Tax Council in Ahmedabad. A truck was intercepted there and it led them to perfume and pan masala manufacturers in Kanpur,” a source said.
“While initially the GST and IT teams had reached the establishments of the owners of these two industries on Friday, they realised soon that the money had been stocked at Jain’s residences and warehouses. Whatever the raiding teams have recovered belongs to three industrialists, including Jain,” the source said.
“Part of this money was to be used in the campaign of some candidates of the two political parties for the Assembly elections next year,” the source added.
Some journalists said they had been invited into Jain’s properties during the raids to click pictures and report extensively on the action.
“The police took us inside Jain’s home in Kanpur to click his pictures and those of the seized currency notes. Later, officers told us that we could shoot his videos at Kakadev police station. Generally, the police don’t allow us to film even a pickpocket in lock-up,” a journalist said.
Reacting to the raids, Samajwadi spokesperson Rajendra Chaudhary said: “Vijay Mallya, Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi are safe in their havens. Nobody can even see them. The government is focusing on small fries to wash off its sin. But it will not happen as people are prepared to throw them out of power in Uttar Pradesh in 2022.”
