Will prove that I am not guilty: TN Health Minister Vijayabaskar on tax raids

State Health Minister CVijaya Baskar on Friday said he was extending full cooperation to the Income Tax authorities in a probe against him and asserted hewould prove that he had done no wrong. 

The Minister’s assertion comes a day after DMK working president M K Stalin urged Chief Minister Edappadi K Palaniswami to sack him after Income Tax authorities attached his properties. 

Terming the DMK demand condemnable and anguishing,Vijaya  Baskar said, “Due to political vendetta, the Leader of the Opposition is making allegations of corruption and it has become his wont.” The Minister said Stalin was hurling “unfounded allegations,” and added that time would “teach him a lesson.”Stalin had made the demand following provisional attachment of the Minister’s properties, including a stone quarry and about 100 acres of land in Pudukkottai district, by the I-T Department as part of its tax evasion probe. 

Following this, the registration department, too, had barred registration of the attached properties. The DMK leader had also made other allegations, including the gutkha scam. Vijaya Baskar, in a statement here, gave a rebuttal seeking to disprove Stalin’s claims. 

“I have been giving full cooperation to tax authorities,” he said, adding he was summoned thrice and on all such occasions he had been to the tax office promptly.

“I will soon legally prove that I did no wrong,” he asserted. He said the land in his native Pudukkottai district, which has now been attached, was bought in 2007 by his family when the AIADMK was not in power and he was neither an MLA nor didhe hold any other public office at that time. 

The minister said he had started a stone quarry business in 2007, but he transferred the administrate responsibilities of the firm to his father through a Power of Attorney after he joined the Cabinet. The firm was compliant with all tax laws and “I would like to make it categorical that my family is not engaged in running a benami enterprise,”  he said.

Vijaya Baskar is in the eye of a political storm and the ruling AIADMK group also faces attack since tax authorities conducted multiple raids on premises belonging to him, his aides and associates in April this year. 

The searches led to unearthing of documents on alleged routing of about Rs 89 crore to voters of R K Nagar. The by-poll in that assembly was cancelled. Also, tax raids on the premises of a gutkha manufacturer last year had led to seizure of documents, which allegedly claimed payout to Vijaya Baskar and officials, including a state top police official.