Odisha cash haul: Amit Shah chides INDIA parties for not suspending MP

New Delhi, Dec 11 (PTI) Days after income tax sleuths seized Rs 351 crore during raids against a distillery firm owned by a Congress MP's family, Home Minister Amit Shah Monday chided the INDIA bloc parties for not suspending the leader from Jharkhand.

"Just now, at an MP's place in Jharkhand, I don't want to say which party he is from but the entire world knows about it, so much cash has been found that even bank's cashiers say that they have never seen so much of cash," Shah said while replying to a debate on two bills related to Jammu and Kashmir in the Rajya Sabha.

He, however, did not name either the MP or the party that he belonged to.

Shah said it has been five days of continuous counting and 27 cash machines deployed for counting have also "heated up", indicating that the counting of cash was still on.

"None of the Ghamandia alliance (in an apparent reference to the opposition INDIA bloc) has neither commented on it nor suspended him. Not a single one (of them)," Shah said.

The searches that began against the Bhubaneswar-headquartered Boudh Distillery Pvt. Ltd. are continuing at about seven locations on Monday, the sixth day after they were launched by the taxman on December 6 on charges of alleged tax evasion and "out of book" transactions.

The IT department has effected the country's highest-every cash seizure of Rs 351 crore by any agency in a single operation after the five-day counting ended on Sunday. The premises of Congress Rajya Sabha MP from Jharkhand Dhiraj Prasad Sahu in Ranchi and other places were also covered during the searches by the department.

As the Congress took objection to Shah's remarks referring to the INDIA bloc as "Ghamandia", he said the opposition was not going to sit to listen to his reply on the bills.

"I know they will not sit. Because OBCs have to be paid respect and reservation have to be given to women. I am fully confident they will not sit. They will walk out. We have heard bitter statements. I heard you for six hours. How will you not listen to me?" Shah said.

Kharge said Shah was deviating from the course of discussion and talking about something else.

"If he talks like this then we are not going to hear. We will walk out," Kharge said, as MPs from his party and some of the opposition parties which are part of the INDIA bloc staged a walkout from the upper house. PTI