Income Tax Raids at Media Baron Raghav Bahl's Noida Home, 'The Quint' Office

New Delhi: The Income Tax department on Thursday raided premises of co-founder of The Quint and former Network18 promoter Raghav Bahl.

The I-T raids were carried out for allegedly evading tax on undisclosed income. The Quint office, too, has been raided by I-T officials.

News18 reached out to Quint's editor-in-chief Ritu Kapoor but is yet to receive a response. As of now, the Income Tax team is carrying on the searches and recording statements of Raghav Bahl's account officials.

Raghav Bahl’s letter to the Editors Guild reads as follows: “I have a matter of great concern to share with the Guild. While I was in Mumbai this morning, dozens of I-T officials descended on my residence and The Quint’s office for a “survey”. We are a fully tax compliant entity, and will provide all access to all appropriate financial documents. However, I have just spoken to the officer on my premises, one Mr Yadav, and requested him, strongly, to not try and pick up or see any other mail/document which is likely to contain very serious/sensitive journalistic material. If they do that, then we shall seek extremely strong recourse. I do hope the EG will back us on this, and thereby set a precedent for any such exercise that may happen on any other journalistic entity in the future. They should also not misuse their smartphones to take unauthorised copies of this material.”

The income tax sleuths also visited The News Minute office in Bengaluru as The Quint is also an investor in the company.

“We are complying with the requests of the officers at our premises,” said Dhanya Rajendran, Editor-in-Chief, The News Minute.