Sleuths from the Income-Tax department today conducted raids at around 32 places across Tamil Nadu, including branches of popular hotel chains including Saravana Bhavan, Anjappar and Grand Sweets. According to sources, the searches were conducted based on information on alleged tax evasion by these entities. "The raids started late this morning and are going on. Outcome of the operation will only be known later," sources added.
The raids in Tamil Nadu have come on a day when similar searches happened at the houses of popular Kannada film personalities including producer Rockline Venkatesh's residence in Mahalakshmi Layout in Bengaluru and actor Puneeth Rajkumar’s residence in Sadashivnagar. According to reports, producers of Blockbuster hit KGF Vijay Kiragandhur and Villain producer CR Manohar have also been raided.
"Eight officers who came in two vehicles raided the house of Rockline Venkatesh in Mahalakshmi Layout and Puneeth Rajkumar’s residence in Sadashivnagar," the reports stated. Reports added that the I-T officials were checking the documents at the residences of the producers. All the mobile phones of the people being raided were switched off and the family members were not available to comment.
Rockline Venkatesh is a film actor, producer and distributor known for his works in Kannada, Tamil, and Hindi cinemas. He is the founder and owner of the production and distribution company, Rockline Entertainments which has produced over twenty-five films as of 2012.
