JOIN USDK Shivakumar's daughter to be questioned today
Senior Congress leader D K Shivakumar's daughter Aisshwarya will appear before the Enforcement Directorate on Thursday, his brother and Congress MP D K Suresh has said.
Aisshwarya has been summoned by the ED following his father's arrest in a money laundering case. The questioning comes a day before Shivakumar's ED custody ends.
"Aisshwarya will face the ED officials tomorrow. Law is applicable to all. She is a courageous girl. If the ED wants to investigate Shivakumar and his family, they are free to do. Similarly, they should also probe other leaders and family," Suresh told reporters.
Shivakumar was arrested on September 3 following days of questioning. Aisshwarya, a management graduate, is being questioned as there are claims that Shivakumar invested money in her name.
The ED officials are likely to record her statement under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). Sources said she would also be confronted with documents and statements made by Shivakumar with regard to a trip to Singapore he made with her in 2017.
She is also a trustee in an education trust floated by Shivakumar and the trust operates a number of engineering and other colleges.
Last September, the ED had registered a case against Shivakumar as well as Anjaneya Hanumanthaiah, an employee at Karnataka Bhavan, and his associates Narayan, S K Sharma and N Rajendra.
The ED case was based on a charge sheet filed by the Income Tax Department against him last year before a special court in Bengaluru on charges of alleged tax evasion and hawala transactions worth crores. The I-T Department had also seized unaccounted money worth around Rs 8.59 crore from him.
The I-T Department had then accused Shivakumar and his associate S K Sharma of transporting huge amount of unaccounted cash on a regular basis through 'hawala' channels with the help of three other accused.
It had claimed that Shivakumar had set up "an extensive network" of persons and premises across Delhi and Bengaluru in order to transport and utilise unaccounted cash.