Rs 4.5 cr cash, Rs 85 cr gold seized from TN Health Minister's home: report

Chennai: Rs 4.5 crores cash and Rs 85 crore worth gold were seized from Tamil Nadu Health Minister Vijayabaskar’s residence in an Income Tax raid on Friday, said ANI reports.

Hours after his Chennai residence was raided, Vijayabaskar said in his defence that the raid was politically motivated.

"I am innocent. I was fully co-operating with IT officials. I showed all my documents and they were unable to find anything. They were threatening me. My child wanted to go to the school but they were not allowed. This is politically motivated. The IT department is harassing me," Vijayabaskar told the media.

After the raids, Vijayabaskar's supporters protested on the roads. The police used water cannons to control the crowd.

The IT conducted raids at Baskar's Greenways road residence and also at other locations including Pudukkottai and Trichy.

The IT officials on Friday morning raided several premises belonging to Vijayab
askar and his relatives in Chennai and other districts in the wake of complaints that he was involved in cash distribution to voters in R.K. Nagar constituency where a by-election will be held on April 12.

Vijayabaskar is a prominent loyalist of AIADMK (Amma) faction's candidate TTV Dinakaran.