While Kamal Nath’s former OSD Praveen Kakkar and the Madhya Pradesh chief minister’s former adviser Rajendra Kumar Miglani are accused of money laundering, the Congress leader’s nephew Ratul Puri, who also runs the company Moser Baer, is suspected to have been involved in the spurious AgustaWestland VVIP chopper deal
New Delhi: After newly-appointed Madhya Pradesh chief minister Kamal Nath found himself in the dock over the alleged involvement of his nephew Ratul Puri in the AgustaWestland VVIP chopper scam, the income tax department raided several locations of his close aides, including his OSD and private secretary, in Delhi NCR and Indore in a pre-dawn sweep on Sunday.
Ratul Puri’s corporate office in Okhla Industrial Area in Delhi is also being raided at the time of writing of the report. This is the office of Hindustan Powerprojects Pvt Ltd (HPPPL), which was earlier Moser Bayer. The company, whose chairman is Puri, operates in power generation, power trading, and renewables across thermal, solar, hydro and mining. The company holds assets, according to estimates, Rs 14,500 crore and is considered by many as the fastest-growing integrated power company of India.
Also read: Kamal Nath's nephew now on Enforcement Directorate's radar in AgustaWestland case
Sources in the IT department told MyNation that, while the search was still on, Rs 9 crore had already been recovered in the raids.
Nath’s private secretary Praveen Kakkar’s house in Indore’s upscale Vijaynagar was raided, apart from his house in BCM Heights, a marriage hall and a flat. Advisor Rajendra Kumar Miglani’s houses in Delhi Bhopal were the focus of IT raids.
Sources also said that establishments associated with Ratul Puri, Amira Group and Moser Bayer have also been raided. Over 300 sleuths of the IT department are involved in the operation.
According to top sources, IT raids were also on at locations in Rishikesh and Noida of Uttar Pradesh and some in Goa.
A total of 27 IT teams had been pressed into action for carrying out raids at an estimated 50 locations across the abovementioned cities.
The raids had to happen, IT sources told MyNation, simultaneously at all the locations originally at 11.30 pm on Saturday night, but the Indore team got late for undisclosed reasons and the raids had to be postponed to 3 am.
Sources also claimed that the phones of these two had been on surveillance for nearly a fortnight.
The CM is campaigning in MP’s Chhindwara, his stronghold which returned him to Parliament nine times, as the raids happened.
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