Income Tax officials find cash worth Rs 10 crore, 2 kg jewellery from Mayawati aide

Mangalore Today News Network

New Delhi, Nov 29, 2014:  Engineer Yadav Singh’s corruption has been so massive that Income Tax officials are yet to drill out the full detail of his illgotten wealth even after twenty raids.

The Income Tax department on Friday raided his residence at Noida’s Sector 51 and found cash worth Rs.10 crore and diamond and gold jewellery of around 2 kg.

Singh, meanwhile, was shunted out of the post of Chief Project Engineer and will no longer be looking after the three authorities of Noida, Greater Noida and Yamuna Expressway. A red-faced Uttar Pradesh government has shifted him to Noida’s CEO office till investigations against him are completed.

On Thursday, the department had found unaccounted assets at the residence and offices of Singh and also unearthed 40 fake companies running under his wife Kusumlata’s name. Sources in the department say Singh’s scam runs over Rs.900 crore.

A team of around 100 officials conducted search operations at 20 buildings located in Noida, Ghaziabad and Delhi. The drive will continue for a few more days.

"We have found evidence to prove that Singh has unaccounted assets. We have seized laptops and documents. We will reveal all details in a day or two," said Krishna Saini, Director (Investigation), Income Tax department, Uttar Pradesh. The team also sealed 13 lockers on Friday that belonged to Singh and his associates. It also found that two firms-Mamta and Meenu creations-were involved in managing Singh’s unaccounted-for money.

Web of deceit

The probe team has discovered that Meenu Creation Private Ltd and McConn Infra Private Limited were involved not only in exporting garments but also in buying land at throwaway prices and selling them at prevailing market rates. Singh allegedly misused his power in these transactions.

Sources said Singh was being interrogated by an I-T team in Delhi. They have detained Anil Peshawari, his business partner, to interrogate him.

"We have found Singh has invested in 35 fake Kolkata-based companies. We are yet to substantiate how he has invested the money. Singh used to get 5% as commission on every contract that he awarded to a contractor," said another official.

Officials said this looks like a clear case of black money and fraud.

Saini said that some officers of Noida Authority would also be grilled in this connection. "It is a survey and search operation in which over 130 I-T officials and an equal number of policemen have been deployed. We have also recovered documents of unnamed properties. We cannot give out more details because the probe is on," Saini said.

Digging deep

Sources said Singh had shares in many real estate companies of Noida and Greater Noida and had a team of contractors who used to work for him.

Although it was out in the public domain since 2007 that Yadav Singh was a corrupt officer who was involved in flouting every land deal norm, the Mayawati government between 2007 and 2012 and the present Akhilesh Yadav government had allegedly favoured him.

Despite facing corruption charges, Mayawati had given him charge of all infrastructure works in Noida. Flouting all norms, he had entered an agreement with several companies for Rs.954-crore projects within eight days in December 2011. In many cases, the deals were sealed without issuance of any tender.

Singh was suspended by the Akhilesh Yadav government in June 2012 from the post of Chief Maintenance Engineer of Noida Authority on charges of corruption. However, a few months later, he was made Chief Engineer (Second) of Noida. The SP government had also given him the charge of Chief Project Officer of Yamuna Expressway Authority. He was practically exercising the powers of a Chief Engineer at all these places.

Yadav Singh and his wife’s case brings to mind tainted Madhya Pradesh’s IAS couple Arvind and Tinoo Joshi’s example. In 2010, an I-T raid led to the initial recovery of Rs.3 crore in cash. Further investigations revealed the MP cadre bureaucrats were in possession of assets disproportionate to their known sources of income which ran into Rs.360 crore.

Courtesy: Indiatoday