IT Shocker To Anna DMK Leader Sasikala In Jail

[Anta Assamey]

The income tax department gave a shocker to Anna DMK leader Sasikala. It attached Rs 300 crore belonging to her and 65 of her expensive assets, including the 10-storied building near Tamil Nadu former Chief Minister late J. Jayalalithaa’s Poes Garden house.

Idenfitying that Sasikala had earned money through illegal means by setting up shell companies, the IT sleuths attached all her properties.

The IT sleuths found that on March 9, 1995, Sasikala floated Sri Hari Chandana Estates Private Limited, a benami company, that operated with its headquarters at Banjara Hills in Hyderabad, Telangana.

Between 2003 and 2005, Sasikala bought 200 acres and a total of 65 assets. Sasikala, who is lodged in a jail in Bengaluru now, was served notices in this connection. In 2017, Sasikala was sentenced to four-year jail in a disproportionate assets case.

Moreover, the sleuths said that during the demonetisation driver, former general secretary of Anna DMK, Sasikala, wrote a letter to her relatives about the purchase of assets worth Rs 1,674 crores. Sasikala had bought valuable assets during demonetisation to exchange the Rs 500 and Rs 1,000 currency notes available with her. She also gave loan to the tune of Rs 237 crore to a contractor of a nutrition scheme in the same period.

In November, the same year, when the IT officials raided Sasikala’s aunt Ilavarasi’s son Vivek Jayaraman’s residence, some letters written by Sasikala were recovered and found that it was the handwriting of Sasikala only.

When the officials questioned Jayaraman about the letters, he said that some unidentified persons gave the letters to the watchman of their house. When they asked why then were the letters kept safe in the house, he said that he wanted to speak to Sasikala about them on phone. The officials also found that the letters had been in the possession of Jayaraman for more than a month by then.

Sasikala’s lawyer Senthil also confirmed that the signature in the letters was that of Sasikala.

The sleuths are planning to unearth the facts with the help of clues in the letters.