Two senior Karnataka government officials were suspended on Friday after the Income Tax sleuths, during a raid, found Rs 6 crore unaccounted money, including Rs 5.7 crore in the new Rs 2,000 denomination.
This is the biggest ever seizure of cash in new currency in the country till date.
With the Opposition demanding stern action against the officials in the ongoing Karnataka legislature session at Belagavi, Home Minister G Parameshwara announced the suspension of senior engineers T.N. Chikkarayappa and S.C. Jayachandra along with two contractors.
Chikkarayappa is the managing director of Cauvery Neeravari Nigama and Jayachandra is the chief project officer of the State Highway Development Project.
While the BJP alleged that both the officials in the dock are close aides of Chief Minister Siddaramaiah, the home minister pointed out that the officers have served in the previous government too.
Interestingly, the government, which is yet to appoint the head to the Lokayukta anti-corruption watchdog, has now ordered a probe by the anti-corruption bureau, raising many questions over it's intent.
The raids carried out by 50 IT sleuths and local police in the residences of the accused in Bengaluru, Chennai and Erode (Tamil Nadu) resulted in the seizure of cash in excess of Rs 6 crore, 7kg of bullion and 9kg of gold jewellery valued at Rs five crore.
The search also revealed that the accused are in possession of high end imported cars like Porsche and Lamborghini. Some property documents were also seized. The total amount of unaccounted income is pegged at Rs 152 core, said a press release from the I-T department.
According to sources, the educational expenses of the children of the accused is also under the radar.
Even as the IT department has written to RBI to ascertain the source of the new currency recovered by them, the Finance Ministry has taken action against as many as 27 bank officials in the country for their involvement in carrying out irregular transactions.
While lauding the banks for their untiring effort in managing banking transactions ever since the Centre demonetised the high value currency Rs 1,000 and Rs 500 from November 8, the ministry has noted some cases of irregularities and violations of RBI instructions.
"27 officials of various public sector banks have been placed under suspension and six officials have been transferred to non-sensitive posts," said a press statement by D.S. Malik, Addl. DG (M&C), Finance.
While all efforts are being made to facilitate genuine transactions, illegalities will not be tolerated and appropriate action will be taken against individuals involved in irregular and unauthorised activities, warned the ministry.
