I-T raids on Kannada actors in B'luru, food chains in TN
Bengaluru: The Income Tax (I-T) department Thursday carried out raids on the residences of four top Kannada film actors and three leading producers in a simultaneous state-wide exercise, officials said.
Actors Shivarajkumar and Puneeth Rajkumar, sons of Kannada thespian late Rajkumar, and Yash and Sudeep came under the I-T lens, officials said, as the bigwigs of the state film industry woke up to the knocks of Income Tax officials on their doors.
The raids were carried out across 23 locations in the state and involved around 200 sleuths, they said.
'Rockline' Venkatesh, C R Manohar and Vijay Kiraganduru are the film producers whose residences were raided, the officials said.
Nicknamed 'Hat trick star', Shivarajkumar is the son-in-law of former chief minister late S Bangarappa.
'Power-star' Puneeth Rajkumar shot to fame for his role as a child artist in the Kannada movie 'Bettada Hoovu' and had won a National Film Award.
Sudeep, who anchored the Kannada version of 'Big Boss', was hailed for his role in the movie 'Eega' (Makkhi in Hindi) and the multi-lingual 'Baahubali', which broke new grounds in Indian cinema and created records in box office collections.
Rockline Venkatesh is a relative of Congress MLA and film producer Munirathna.
He had co-produced the Hindi movie "Bajrangi Bhaijaan".
Vijay is the producer of the latest blockbuster movie "KGF", starring Yash, Srinidhi Shetty and Anant Nag.
C R Manohar has his own production house called 'Tanvi Films.' He has produced Kannada and Telugu movies.
His latest movie was 'The Villain', starring Shivarajkumar, Sudeep and Mithun Chakraborty.
The Income Tax Department Thursday also conducted searches at over two dozen premises of popular hotel and restaurant chains in Tamil Nadu on charges of alleged tax evasion, officials said.
They said the raids are being carried out at 32 locations of companies like Saravana Bhavan, Hot Bread, Anjappal and Grand Sweets.
The residences and offices of the directors of these food-joint chains are being raided by a team of over 100 I-T sleuths, the officials said.
