Quintillion Media Group founders Raghav Bahl and Ritu Kapur on Friday warned news colleagues “to be vigilant against similar state vendetta” a day after income-tax officials searched and surveyed their premises in Noida.
The warning came on a day the Telugu Desam Party accused the Centre of “intimidation politics” after the income-tax department raided the Hyderabad office and Kadappa home of Rajya Sabha member C.M. Ramesh.
Party sources said Ramesh was the latest Desam member raided as part of what they termed “Operation Garuda” — an alleged plan to destabilise the Andhra Pradesh government to avenge Chandrababu Naidu’s pullout from the Narendra Modi government earlier this year.
Bahl issued a detailed statement jointly with Kapur (who happens to be his wife) and the Quintillion Media Group, flagging the questions asked by the tax officials and providing his responses.
“We were astonished to see that a blatant attempt had been made by the government’s spin-masters to say that the action was part of a yearlong investigation into some long-term capital gains (LTCG) scam, whereby Raghav Bahl and Ritu Kapur had made ‘bogus’ income of Rs 118 cr. Without much ado, here are the facts of that case (not claims),” the statement said.
“All these and other gains/ losses were fully detailed/ declared in the appropriate year of tax filings; and more importantly, were accepted and assessed to tax, under this very government! So the attempt to ‘colour’ our tax returns, now, as ‘bogus’, is clearly a frame-up, and we shall take every legal recourse to protect our fair name and reputation in this case.”
Sources said Desam MP Ramesh was being targeted because he had pushed the public accounts committee, of which he is a member, to issue a notice to the income-tax department to furnish details about their raids in Andhra Pradesh.
The department had earlier raided the premises of businessman and Naidu associate Beeda Masthan Rao and Desam parliamentary party leader Y.S. Chowdhary.
The raids on Desam members who happen to be industrialists is being seen as an attempt to hit the party’s finances ahead of elections, particularly as Naidu is said to have helped the Janata Dal Secular financially during the Karnataka Assembly polls.
These raids come at a time when the Desam is finalising a seat-sharing arrangement with the Congress and smaller parties for the Telangana Assembly elections.
“The Centre has begun intimidation politics with IT raids on party leaders Mastan Rao Garu, Sujana Garu and now CM Ramesh Garu. TDP leaders are being unduly targeted for raising voice against the Centre for breaking every promise made during bifurcation,” tweeted Naidu’s son and Desam general secretary Nara Lokesh.
“We will not be cowed down by this! It will only make our resolve stronger!!”
