It seems like the multi-crore tax evasion case linked to the National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) exams by the ex-deputy Chief Minister of Karnataka, G. Parmeshwara, who served in the 14-month JD-S-Congress coalition government has started to take an ugly turn. Parameshwara’s personal assistant N.S. Ramesh on Saturday allegedly committed suicide due to “tax raids” on his boss’s 30 properties around the town since Thursday.
A security guard spotted Ramesh’s body hanging on the tree and alerted the local police. Ramesh’s death occurred a day after the I-T department said in a statement on Friday night that Rs 4.22 crore in unaccounted cash was found during the raids on Parameshwara and former MP R L Jalappa’s son J Rajendra’s residences since October 10.
Ramesh worked as a computer operator at the Karnataka Pradesh Congress Committee (KPCC) for over a decade and became Parameshwara’s PA after he relinquished the party’s state unit president’s post five years ago and became a minister in the previous Congress government.
A suicide note was found from the suicide spot that read, “I am rattled with the I-T raids in my house and have decided to commit suicide to protect honour. Anguished with the culture that the poor should remain poor forever, I arrived at this decision.”
According to the income-tax officials, raids on educational institutions run by Congress leaders is merely the tip of the iceberg. The I-T officials suspect a major scam wherein medical college managements blocked seats under the NEET examinations and later sold them at exorbitant rates. A senior I-T official monitoring the raids said they found 168 out of 300 medical seats allotted under management quota by the three private medical colleges (which are deemed universities) were blocked and later sold to students, who secured low ranks. These seats were allegedly sold at a minimum Rs 50 lakh per seat while the actual fee is only about Rs 6 lakh.
The investigators have unearthed that such seats were re-allotted to 54 students in Devaraj Urs Medical College (of RL Jalappa) and 114 seats in Sri Siddhartha Medical College and Sri Siddhartha Institute of Medical Sciences and Research, both, not surprisingly owned by G Parameshwara. His family runs the Siddhartha Group of Institutions, established by Parameshwara’s father HM Gangadharaiah 58 years ago.
The income tax took the swift action as part of its probe to check alleged irregularities in the conduct of NEET exams in two medical colleges run by Shri Siddhartha Education Trust in Tumakuru city in Karnataka of which Parameshwara is stated to be the chairman.
The I-T department has, therefore, summoned the Congress leader for questioning on Tuesday in connection with the raids. The sources have said that preliminary investigation showed that several more private medical colleges are also in the medical seat-selling nexus.
Earlier, Cafe Coffee Day founder-chairman VG Siddhartha had committed suicide on July 29 by jumping from a road bridge into a river near Mangaluru on the state’s west coast, allegedly due to harassment by tax sleuths. Though the CCD business was profitable Siddhartha used the money from this business and diverted it to invest in stock markets and because of his financial irregularities he put himself under duress and had to take the drastic step of committing suicide. Similarly, it looks like Ramesh was under pressure courtesy his boss’s fishy dealings and even if the police have to go by his suicide note, both the IT officials and G. Parmeshwara need to be brought under the scanner and investigated properly.