The ousted Tamil Nadu chief secretary Papisetty Rama Mohana Rao took up cudgels against the Centre, declaring that the raids against him were illegal as the warrant issued by the IT department did not mention his name. The warrant was in his son P Vivek’s name, who had not stayed in his (Rao’s) house even for a week, said Rao.
Rao hails from Chittoor district in Andhra Pradesh.
He said no incriminating document had been seized from his house or office to justify the raids. Moreover, only Rs 1.12 lakh cash, 40-50 sovereigns of gold ornaments that his wife and daughter were wearing and around 25 kg of silver articles, mostly idols of gods, were found in his house during the raids, he said. He released copies of the ‘Panchanamas’ issued by the IT department as proof.
Claiming that he was still the Chief Secretary of Tamil Nadu, Rao called the raids “a constitutional assault on the office of the chief secretary”. If Jayalalithaa had been alive, “would this raid have happened?” he asked. He said his son, who worked in Microsoft earlier, did not live with him after his return from the US.
He claimed that the state government had no guts to serve him a transfer order. “No order has been issued to me till now. I claim, I am still the chief secretary appointed by ‘Puratchi Thalaivi Honourable Madam,” he said. If the IT department had wanted to raid the chief secretary’s house or office, the Centre should have asked the state government to remove him from the post before conducting the raids, said Rao.
