The Karnataka energy minister DK Shivakumar on Monday appeared before the Income Tax department officials. He was questioned at the Bengaluru office for almost four hours at the Bengaluru office. As he was done with the interrogation, Shivakumar said to media personnel, “I am not afraid, I will do my regular duties and will also appear for enquiries”.
Shivakumar was summoned on Sunday by the IT department along with his associates at the regional office in Bengaluru for questioning. The I-T Department had conducted search and seizure operations from August 2-5 against Shivakumar and his associates and had found more than Rs 300 crore of undisclosed money from minister’s residence in Bengaluru and Delhi. Some reports said that the minister has asked two days’ time – till Wednesday – and would not appear for questioning on Monday. However, he walked into the I-T Department’s regional office on Infantry Road at around 12:30 pm.
Notably, the IT department suspected to have found a huge cache of documents that unearthed undisclosed income of nearly Rs 300 crore during the marathon raids on Shivakumar and his family members and several other firms across the state that had business links with him. The I-T Department is yet to issue a formal statement on the raids and still, there is no clarity on what part of the undisclosed income belongs to Shivakumar. During the raids, the I-T sleuths found Rs 8 crore cash from Shivakumar’s residence in New Delhi located at Safdarjung Road.
The I-T department said that the summons was part of the procedures, where notices were sent to places which have been raided in last few days.
