Kerala CM Pinarayi Vijayan demands judicial enquiry into realtor C.J. Roy’s suspected suicide during IT raid

Kerala’s Chief Minister Pinarayi Vijayan has written to the Union Minister of Finance and Corporate Affairs, Nirmala Seetharaman, requesting a judicial enquiry into the unnatural death of C.J. Roy, a realtor and head of the Confidant Group of Builders, during an Income Tax raid on his office in Bengaluru, Karnataka, on January 30. 

Mr. Vijayan said the suspected death by suicide of the entrepreneur had shocked civic society and the business community. He termed the incident a “blot” on the country’s tax administration. Mr Vijayan said Income Tax enforcement was singularly guided by the Centre’s stated Non-Intrusive Usage of Data to Guide and Enable (NUDGE). Mr. Vijayan said some rare situations might warrant “intrusive action”. However, he said, “extreme caution” was the norm. 

Mr. Vijayan said reports suggested that IT enforcers displayed a “lack of required diligence”, which resulted in the loss of the “precious life of an entrepreneur”. He said, commenting on the merit of the search and seizure action by the Income Tax Department at the current juncture, was “inappropriate”. 

Nevertheless, Mr. Vijayan said, he could not refrain from “drawing certain prudent inference, based on the information available in the public domain”. He said the fact that Roy could lay his hands on a loaded gun and shoot himself when an IT search and seizure operation was on in the same premises was “quite surprising”.

Mr. Vijayan said the IT department was primarily responsible for the safety of the premises it inspected. “It is the minimum responsibility of the IT officials. Moreover, the IT officials have to respect certain rights of the individual under investigation”, he said. 

Mr. Vijayan said the presence of the person under scrutiny was mandatory when the IT department executed a search-and-seizure warrant. “In the present case, if the media reports are correct, Mr Roy moved to another room, drew his licensed gun, and shot himself while the search was in progress. If correct, this is a serious lapse. It points to non-compliance by IT officials with the minimum essential protocol, resulting in the loss of a human life,” Mr. Vijayan said. 

Moreover, Mr. Vijayan noted that the bereaved family had said that the IT officials pursued Roy relentlessly, despite his having fully cooperated with the investigation and submitted the necessary documents. Mr. Vijayan noted that Roy’s brother had told reporters that the IT officials kept returning, and that his sibling had repeatedly told him the “IT trouble was unbearable”. 

Mr. Vijayan conceded that the I-T Department might have its version of the events. Moreover, tax evasion was a serious issue. The Karnataka police were investigating Roy’s death. Nevertheless, the Central government must view the family’s grievances with empathy. Hence, Mr. Vijayan said, an “impartial inquiry headed by a person who served in a constitutional court of law was in order to scrutinise the wider aspects and ramifications of the case”, he said.