The revelations made by the Income Tax department on Thursday about the busting of a major scam worth over Rs 2,000 crore through searches on houses of various companies and individuals related to Telugu Desam Party has created sensations in the media and political circles.
Particularly, the searches in the residences of P Srinivasa Rao, former personal secretary of TDP president N Chandrababu Naidu during the latter’s regime as the chief minister between 2014 and 2018, by the Income Tax department officials for five consecutive days have raised many eyebrows.
The fact that the Income Tax department spokesman specifically mentioned that the search operation was carried out on close associates including expersonal secretary of a prominent person and incriminating evidence was found in the searches clearly indicated that the main target of the department authorities was Naidu.
Since the department specifically mentioned about “a prominent person,” it has created to speculations that Srinivas might have surrendered to the authorities and made a lot of revelations about the TDP chief and his family.
The I-T department authorities claimed to have found several incriminating documents and loose papers and discovered several emails, WhatsApp messages and unexplained foreign transactions during the searches.
It is believed that these e-mails and messages related to Srinivas’s correspondence with Naidu and his family members, including Lokesh and Bhuvaneshwari.
If Srinivas had really spilled the beans about the alleged monetary transactions of Naidu family, then it will be a big trouble for the TDP chief.
“Even if the magnitude of the transactions might not be as high as Rs 2,000 crore as being alleged by YSRC leaders, it would definitely cause a lot of beating for Naidu’s image, if Srinivas disclosed anything incriminating,” an official source said.