The Income Tax sleuths on Thursday conducted simultaneous searches at the offices of construction firm My Home Group, and the residence of the group's Chairman, Rameshwar Rao Jupally, in Hyderabad.
The group descended on the company's head office at Madhapur and another office at Begumpet, in addition to Rameshwar Rao's home at Nandagiri Hills in Jubilee Hills.
The searches were headed by I-T teams from Bengaluru and were reportedly related to a joint venture between My Home Group and a Bengaluru-based firm, RMZ Corp.
The two companies are presently constructing a commercial space cluster dubbed 'Skyview' in Hyderabad's IT corridor. The cluster involves two massive buildings coming up over 10.38 acres, with 3.73 million sqft in the office area, which can accommodate about 40,000 employees.
Some I-T officials claimed that the searches were a 'routine' one, adding that they are expected to continue on Friday as well. The My Home Group is yet to respond to the latest developments and issue a statement.
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IT searches conducted at residence & office of My Home group chairman J. Rameshwar Rao on Thursday @AbhinayTheHindu pic.twitter.com/6aSo0RVgII
Jupally Rameshwar Rao is an influential businessman in Telangana and is known to be close to various politicians, including Telangana Chief Minister K Chandrasekhar Rao. He is also close to Sri Tridandi Srimannarayana Ramanuja Chinna Jeeyar Swamiji, more popularly known as 'Chinna Jeeyar,' a Vedic pontiff, who has also been the 'philosophical adviser' to KCR for the past 30 years.
Rameshwar Rao was recently in the news after former TV9 CEO Ravi Prakash accused him of a hostile takeover of Associated Broadcasting Private Limited (ABCL), the promoting company of TV9. Rao presently owns 62% of Alanda and has control over TV9.
According to the company's website, "My Home Group is a large and fast-growing company with a turnover in excess of Rs 3,350 crore based out of Hyderabad. The group has a presence across the nation with interests in an entire value chain comprising construction, cement, power, consultancy and education."