The Karnataka High Court on Monday dismissed the petition filed by former Water Resource Minister DK Shivakumar’s associate, who had sought to quash the Income Tax Department’s investigation against him regarding alleged tax evasion and money laundering.
The court dismissed Shivakumar’s business associate – Sachin Narayana’s petition in the wake of the Enforcement Directorate’s probe, into Shivakumar’s alleged money laundering activities.
The Karnataka High Court had granted a stay on the Income Tax Department’s probe against Shivakumar on July 30 this year. One of the accused in the case – Sachin Narayana, DK Shivakumar’s business associate, had initially filed a petition to quash the Income Tax Department’s investigation with a Bengaluru sessions court in July this year. However, the sessions court had dismissed his petition.
He had then moved the Karnataka High Court and on July 30, the court had issued an interim stay on the Income Tax Department’s probe. The High Court had then issued a common stay order for all accused in the case including DK Shivakumar.
However, on August 17, Justice B Veerappa had modified the stay order and had only stayed the probe against one of the accused in the case – Sachin Narayana.
The High Court modified the interim order after Additional Solicitor General of India (Karnataka HC) Prabuling Navadgi, who appeared for the Income Tax Department, told the court that the interim stay order was obtained by “suppressing” the fact that the Economic Offences Court had registered a criminal case and issued summons to all the accused much before the petition was filed before the High Court.
The I-T Department filed the criminal case against DK Shivakumar, Karnataka Bhavan employee Anjaneya, Sunil Kumar Sharma – the proprietor of Sharma Travels and Sachin Narayana, for recovering alleged unaccounted cash of Rs 8.59 crore during search and seizure operations conducted at four apartments belonging to Shivakumar and his business associates, in Delhi in 2017.