Police have seized Rs. 45 crore in demonetised currency notes from a uniform shop owner's residence in Kodambakkam on Thursday, according to multiple media reports. Based on a tip-off the police reportedly raided the shop, only to find the scrapped Rs.500 and Rs.1000 notes stuffed in a gunny bag.
While the notes have no value, the Income Tax department has joined the probe to find out how the owner, D Dhandapani had such a large amount of cash.
According to TNIE, police suspected Dhandapani could have procured the cash a week ago from a T Nagar jewellery shop broker Padam Salani from Rajasthan.
A police team from T Nagar, headed by Assistant Commissioner Tamizhselvan, reportedly lead the searches. It was conducted at Dhandapani's residence-cum-shop in Kodambakkam’s Zachariah Colony, 2nd street, which is famous for selling police uniform, at around 1 am. When the initial search did not yield anything substantial, the policemen were reportedly preparing to leave. This was when one of them spotted a suspicious looking gunny bag. They opened it to find demonetised notes stashed in it.
According to reports, the owner was taken into custody and he told police that a realtor from Pondy Bazaar had given him the money to be stored in the shop. Police however seem to suspect that Dhandapani was acting as an agent exchanging old currency notes for a commission.
Since the Prime Minister announced demonetisation on November 8, there have been multiple raids in Chennai. In December 2016, Tamil Nadu sand mining baron, Shekar Reddy, had been arrested following massive seizure after the Income Tax department raided his premises. During the raid, the IT department had seized currency notes worth Rs 131 crore, including Rs 34 crore of new notes and 127 kg gold from the TN businessman.
Following this raids were even conducted on properties belonging to Tamil Nadu Chief Secretary P Rama Mohana Rao.