Hyderabad: The Income Tax department, which closely monitored the Miyapur land scam that broke in May this year, raided the offices of Goldstone Infratech Ltd and the residences of its owner P.S. Prasad alias Goldstone Prasad, on Thursday.
Goldstone Infratech was incorporated in 2000 and established several companies under the Goldstone Group. I-T sleuths have identified that the proprietor of the company, P.S. Prasad, established shell companies to convert black money into white.
Official sources from the I-T department said that 14 teams from the department conducted simultaneous raids at the offices of Goldstone Infratech and the residences of the directors of the company.
“Twelve teams are still searching at various places including Secunderabad, Jubilee Hills and Cherlapally. Another two teams are continuing searches in New Delhi,” the sources said.
The raids started in the morning when P S Prasad was on his morning walk.
Goldstone Prasad tried to run away
“Goldstone Prasad and his brother P. Partha-saradhi are allegedly involved in money laundering using shell companies and they are using benami entities for land transactions. We have taken up the search as a part of ‘Operation Clean Money’. We have seized records from the company,” an I-T officer said.
I-T sleuths found that five shell companies have been registered in the names of employees of Goldstone. “We are also verifying the role of the employees and questioning them. So far, they have not revealed any information about the shell companies; they say they are unaware about the companies,” another source in the I-T department said.
The raids started in the morning when P.S. Prasad was on his morning walk. He tried to run away but was caught and questioned along with his brother Parthasara-dhi.
