CHENNAI, OCT 7
The Income Tax Department has attached assets worth Rs 2,000 crore in the name of former Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa’s close aide V K Sasikala, her sister-in-law Ilavarasi and V N Sudhakaran including bungalows at Siruthavur on the outskirts of Chennai and at Kodanad in the Nilgiris district.
The assets were attached by the Benami Prohibition wing of the Income Tax Department. Sasikala, Ilavarasi and Sudhakaran are serving a four-year sentence in a disproportionate assets case.
This follows in the wake of the Benami Prohibition unit in Chennai provisionally attaching properties in and around the city worth Rs 300 crore. Sasikala is said to have purchased these properties, including a site diagonally opposite to the residence of late Chief Minister J Jayalalithaa’s Veda Nilayam, through shell companies.
I-T sources said that a notice had been served to Sasikala at the Parappana Agrahara Prison in Bengaluru, the benami company and the various Sub-Registrar Offices (SROs) under whose jurisdiction the properties are situated.
The provisional order of the attachment has been issued under section 24(3) of the Prohibition of Benami Property Transactions Act, 1988.
