Image credit : Illustrative Image

Chennai: The five-day long income tax raids at various establishments connected with sidelined AIADMK leader VK Sasikala over, officials have begun the process for questioning people at the Income-Tax office here at Nungambakkam.

According to sources, Sasikala’s brother V Dhivakaran, who owns STET College in Sundarakottai and nephew TTV Dhinakaran have been summoned for interrogation. Three officials of Jazz Cinemas, owned by Sasikala’s nephew Vivek Jayaraman, will also be quizzed.

Vivek, whose residence and offices were raided during the last few days, was questioned by the IT sleuths from 5 pm to 10 pm yesterday. The CEO of Jaya TV and Jazz Cinemas told mediapersons not to make the raids a big thing. “The IT department will call me again and I will cooperate with them. Even the jewels my wife wore for our marriage were questioned. I have accounts for all of them. They asked for the accounts of Jazz Cinemas and Jaya TV. I have been looking after Jaya TV only for the past two years. I am offering full cooperation to officials.”

However, IT sources alleged that he had been running several bogus companies. They claimed they had details of how he even registered companies using his drivers and domestic maids as benamis.

IT officials are said to have summoned Dr Shivakumar, son-in-law of Ilavarasi, Sasikala’s sister-in-law. He was interrogated for two hours yesterday.

A team of 1,800 officials were involved in the raids at 187 locations. While sources in the department claim there has been tax evasion of around Rs 1,430 crore and seizure of Rs7 crore in cash and jewellery worth Rs 5 crore, there has been no official comment on the matter. It is said several bank accounts and 15 bank lockers have been frozen.

On 9 November, Several family members of Sasikala and her associates were brought under the scanner.