As a part of the nationwide raids on unaccounted money, Income Tax department officials searched the offices and homes of producers of the multilingual movie Bahubali on Friday.
A 25-member I-T team split into three groups and raided the places of producers Shobhu Yarlagadda and Prasad Devineni. According to sources in the film unit, I-T sleuths found Rs 60 crore cash so far and the search is going on.
The raid came as a shocker on Tollywood which is reeling from the impact of the sudden demonetisation of high value currency.
The producers, who have advanced plans for the audio release of Bahubali Part 2, were not available for comment, though the raids are thought to be a shock as they were on the verge of selling the movie rights to various markets, including Bollywood.
Only recently, producer Karan Johar, who distributed the Hindi version of part one, Bahubali: The Beginning, reportedly stepped back from releasing the movie in north India due to high price quoted by the producers for its theatrical rights.
Bahubali was the only dubbed movie in Hindi that did a record Rs 100 crore business.