Income Tax Action Amid Jharkhand Elections: Raids on CM Soren's Private Secretary Sunil Srivastava's office

The Income Tax Department raids multiple locations allegedly connected to private secretary Sunil Srivastava in Jharkhand. The department carried out raids at seven places in Ranchi and several in Jamshedpur besides other offices. The act comes as an important development during the election season going on in Jharkhand.

Also Read: Powerful Blast at Pakistan's Quetta Railway Station Kills 20, Many Injured

Earlier on 14 October, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) conducted raids at the premises of Vinay Thakur, brother to Jharkhand's cabinet minister Mithilesh Thakur, personal secretary Harendra Singh, and several engineers from the Jal Jeevan Mission department in connection with an alleged corruption case.

Who is Sunil Srivastava?

Sunil Srivastava is the private secretary to CM Hemant Soren. Currently, searches are on at his Ashok Nagar residence in Ranchi and other connected places by Income Tax Department.

When is Assembly Elections?

These actions have now attracted attention in the context of the Assembly elections in Jharkhand only a few days from now. Elections would be held in two phases across the 81 seats in Jharkhand. The first phase, which would cover the elections to 43 seats, is scheduled for November 13, after which voting on 38 seats would take place on November 20. The election results are likely to be declared on November 23.

This was not the first ED raid at his properties

The ED had raided premises also in Jharkhand ahead of this. In Ranchi, the ED had on Thursday searched Ratu Road residence of businessman Vijay Agarwal and another on Harihar Singh Road in Morhabadi as part of investigations into alleged fraud linked to Jal Jeevan Mission.

It had earlier raided over 20 premises, including the houses of IAS officer Manish Ranjan and Minister Mithilesh Thakur's brother Vinay Thakur, in a countrywide crackdown on engineers working under the Jal Jeevan Mission.

What is Jal Jeevan Mission?

The Jal Jeevan Mission was one of the initiatives launched by the central government in 2019, which targeted ensuring safe and reliable supply to every household. Under this, the Hemant Soren-led state government set an ambitious target for connecting 3.4 million households with tap water under this mission for the financial year 2022-23. As of February 2024, the Jal Jeevan Mission had made tap water connections to about 20% of households in Jharkhand.

A series of high-profile raids against the officers of government put such an immense pressure on Jharkhand's administration with such crucial elections approaching in the state. Both Income Tax Department and ED's continuous actions signify prevalent concerns about corruption in the key government projects being undertaken by the state.