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The Hindu
The Hindu
National
Staff Reporter

DesignBoxed says I-T raid was ‘political’

A file photo of Income Tax Department office on Queens Road in Bengaluru. (Source: K. Murali Kumar)

DesignBoxed, a political campaign management firm working for opposition Congress and recently the target of search and seizure operations by Income Tax Department, has alleged that the raids were ‘obviously political’ and ‘part of the process of stifling the opposition through State power’.

Naresh Arora, Managing Director, DesignBoxed said IT sleuths ‘found absolutely nothing — no unaccounted valuable of any kind’. “They targeted me and my colleagues only because we have been working for the opposition, and mainly Congress party. Apart from trying to find anything remotely incriminatory against top Congress leaders, the raids were intended to intimidate a self-made professional and political campaign management firm so that we don’t work for India’s main opposition party. It is unfortunate that even after being so powerful, the ruling dispensation needs to intimidate those working with the opposition. An outright abuse of tax agencies for political aims is not what democracies do,” he said.

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