The income tax department’s raids that began from perfume traders in Uttar Pradesh’s Kannauj has now reached Noida. This time shockingly it does not involve a businessman but a 1983 batch IPS officer of UP cadre. Officials have found Rs 5.8 crore cash kept in several private lockers, which they say, are likely to be unaccounted for.
Former IPS officer Ram Narayan Singh was running a private firm — Manasam Noida Vault — from the basement of his house in A block of Sector 50. A senior official said that the company was opened in 2017, the same year that Singh retired. According to a report in Times of India, the firm had 700 private lockers, most of which were found to be empty. The cash and some documents were found stashed in 18-20 lockers.
“Unaccounted cash of Rs 5.8 crore has been recovered so far and seized. It was in the denominations of 2,000-rupee and 500-rupee notes. We have launched an investigation into whether this cash was from some benami property,” an official was quoted as saying.
The company has been registered in the name of Singh’s wife. while the couple’s son is the custodian of the lockers. “We are trying to find out if the owner of the lockers had any link with politicians or if the money was being made available to candidates contesting the elections in the state,” the I-T official was quoted.
Are Raids Connected to UP Polls?
According to a report in Navbharat Times, 10 lockers that did not have any mention of the owner or their addresses were opened till Tuesday. The team installed three machines to count the cash, leading them to a total of over Rs 5 crore. A titbit from the report stated that the notes were in such large quantity that machines began hanging due to continuous counting.
Another NBT report stated that from January 15 till now, black money to the tune of about Rs 2.5 crore has been found. The Income Tax department has been on its toes since the Uttar Pradesh assembly elections are just round the corner. Elaborate arrangements have been made to curb the use of black money in the polls. A control room with toll-free number 18001807540, which will remain operational round the clock, has been set up in Lucknow.
Assembly polls will be held in UP in seven phases, starting February 10. Polls to the constituencies in Gautam Budh Nagar and Ghaziabad will be held in the first phase.
As the information on the raids blew up, Singh told a news conference, “After my retirement, I stayed in my village. There is a private locker facility that we provide. Two lockers are in my name. Nothing illegal has been found in them except family jewellery. The I-T team is searching the other lockers. I don’t know about the cash that has been recovered.”
Black Money and Politics
Income tax raids in Uttar Pradesh recently have triggered a war of words among political parties. It all began from the searches in Samajwadi Party bastion Kannauj, famous for perfume-making units. The first trader to be raided was Peeyush Jain, who was initially mixed up with SP MLC (Member of Legislative Council) and perfume baron Pushpraj ‘Pampi’ Jain. However, later premises of Pushpraj, who stays in Peeyush’s neighbourhood, were raided too.
Top BJP leaders including Prime Minister Narendra Modi, Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Yogi Adityanath targeted the Samajwadi Party. The CM said this was the reason Akhilesh Yadav was opposed to demonetisation.
Traditionally, the Kannauj-Etawah-Mainpuri- Saifai belt has seen the Samajwadi Party’s domination. Former UP Chief Minister Akhilesh Yadav’s wife Dimple Yadav was a Member of Parliament (MP) from Kannauj in 2014 but was defeated by a BJP candidate in 2019.
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