‘Gangula firms have links to Chinese entity’

PNS | New Delhi

Illegal funds sent from a Chinese entity, owned by a man named in the leaked Panama Papers, to Telangana-based granite businesses has been found after premises of a number of granite exporters, including that of state welfare minister Gangula Kamalakar, were raided, the ED claimed on Friday.

The federal agency launched the searches, under sections of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA), on November 9 at the offices and residential premises of Swetha Granites, Swetha Agencies, Sri Venkateshwara Granites Private Limited, PSR Granites Private Limited, Arvind Granites, Giriraj Shipping Agencies Private Limited and their related entities in Karimnagar and Hyderabad.

The premises of Kamalakar, allegedly linked to some of these companies, were also searched.The minister for backward classes welfare, food and civil supplies in the K Chandrasekhar Rao-led state government, who was abroad during the searches, later told reporters that he will cooperate with the agency and that he had done no wrong.