CHENNAI: In the wake of reports that the
Income Tax investigation wing had written to the state vigilance commissioner detailing health minister C Vijaya Baskar’s business empire and his father R Chinnathambi’s confession on receiving bribe from job aspirants, a senior official confirmed the government received the letter. It has been forwarded to director of vigilance and anticorruption for a preliminary inquiry, he said.
I-T officials said they stumbled upon evidence of payments received by Chinnathambi while searching houses of Vijaya Baskar, his family members and
associates in April 2017. “We completed the investigation two months ago. We recently sent reports regarding the search to the government,” a senior I-T official said. The report said I-T officials seized ₹20 crore in cash and many documents.
The report says, “…interview call letters of respective candidates were also seized vide annexure ANN/VB-CT/DN/LS/S1 having pages no 1-28 …. In this regard a sworn statement u/s123(4) of the Income Tac Act, 1961was recorded from Shri Chinnathambi, father of Shri C Vijayabaskar on 07.04.2017 and he stated that cash of ₹12,96,000 was received from various persons to get job for each of them. However, in the sworn statement recorded from C Vijayabaskar, he refused to be aware of the same.”
After a section of media reported the news on Saturday, Chinnathambi issued a denial through the health department PRO. “Searches were done by the I-T department on April 7, 2017 but unlike what a section of media says, no unaccounted money was seized and I did not give any statement to the department,” it said. But, the I-T report said of the ₹20 crore seized, ₹12.96 lakh (in brown covers with names of respective candidates on each for government jobs) was recovered from his personal assistant’s house. “Two incriminating documents containing date-wise noting of fund collection and its application” were recovered from janakiramanseenu@gmail.com operated by health minister’s PA J Srinivasan, it said.
Meanwhile, health minister Vijaya Baskar told TOI over phone from Pudukottai that opposition leader M K Stalin was doing whatever he could to defame him and the ruling party. “No illegal money or document was seized from me, my family or associates. People are flaunting some loose sheets, which they claim are part of an I-T report. We don’t know what they have said in it, but I strongly deny any wrongdoing. We have decided to face this issue legally,” he said.
