Directorate of Enforcement (ED) officials on Wednesday carried out a search operation on a sprawling property on Karur-Coimbatore Road in Karur, where V. Ashok Kumar, brother of jailed Tamil Nadu Minister V. Senthilbalaji, is allegedly building a bungalow. The search is being carried out as Mr. Senthilbalaji is subjected to interrogation in Chennai after being taken into five-day custody by ED officials. He was arrested in a money laundering case on June 14.
Accompanied by Central Reserve Police Force (CRPF) personnel, the ED officials, took over the property on Karur-Coimbatore Road, measuring about 2.5 acres, around 1 p.m, and began the search in the half-finished structures.
The officials were said to have engaged a team of certified engineers, valuers and surveyors to measure the structures to figure out the estimated cost of the construction. According to sources, the officials tried to contact Mr. Ashok Kumar and his wife Nirmala over phone to ask them to be present at the property but did not get a response.
The officials then visited the residence of Mr. Ashok Kumar at Ramakrishnapuram to serve summons. Since no one was present, the officials pasted a notice that summoned Ms. Nirmala to the property on Karur-Coimbatore Road and asked her to furnish documents related to the under-construction bungalow on Wednesday.
Another team of ED officials visited the Sub-Registrar office in Karur later in the day and asked for the registration documents related to a property on Karur-Salem Road, suspecting that the land could have been undervalued at the time of registration.
Mr. Ashok Kumar, who has been summoned repeatedly by the Enforcement Directorate and the Income Tax Department, is yet to appear before officials. Wednesday’s search was the ED’s third such drive in Karur within the last two months. The first was carried out on June 13. The officials carried out simultaneous searches at the residences of Mr. Senthilbalaji and the properties of persons linked to him in Karur and Chennai on that day. On August 3, they carried out a second round of searches in Karur.
