The Enforcement Directorate sent several teams to launch simultaneous searches at 25 locations across Tamil Nadu on Tuesday. The sand mines, sales depot and other locations were raided which are allegedly involved in a sand mining scam including money laundering and tax evasion.
The ED is aiming at chartered accountant S Ramachandran and sand mining contractor Rathinam for the raids today. The searches were reportedly conducted in several locations of Dindigul in Tamil Nadu where Rathinam is based from.
According to the reports, the Tamil Nadu police were not informed about the raids beforehand and the ED teams had taken the support of the Central Armed Police Force for their searches. A police officer told The Hindu, "There is information that searches are going on in more than 25 locations in Vellore, Tiruchi, Karur, Pudukottai etc at sand sales depots and the offices/residences of sand mining contractors."
Searches are underway at the offices and homes of major sand mining contractors.
The mining portfolio in the Tamil Nadu government is held by Durai Murugan who is also the General Secretary of the ruling DMK.
The Tamil Nadu Water Resources Department manages the sand that is mined from riverbeds and sold at the sand depots or sales points.
Reportedly, sand is sold by means of a website operated by the Water Resources Department and via an e-receipt issued at depots. As e-receipts are issued for the sale of sand online, it is claimed that a considerable amount of sand is purchased offline but not entered in the record at regular intervals. The probe agency is now investigating if tax was properly credited to government accounts from the e-receipts that were issued to several vehicle owners and operators, as per reports.
