Calangute dy sarpanch, panch Joseph Sequeira also raided
TEAM HERALD
MARGAO/CALANGUTE: Income Tax sleuths from Goa, Bangalore and Hubli raided the Betalbatim residence-cum-office premises of Goa Vikas Party supremo and Nuvem MLA Francisco Mickky Pacheco, and the residences of Calangute deputy sarpanch Subhash Salgaonkar and Calangute panch and de facto leader Joseph Sequeira at 7.30 am Thursday.
The house of Mickky’s former personal assistant and chairman of the Goa Meat Complex and secretary of GVP Lyndon Monteiro was also raided Thursday, in the day long searches.
The raiding team also searched the Cansaulim house of Mickky’s wife Viola and also interrogated her brother. Members of the raiding team declined to answer any queries from the waiting media persons outside Mickky’s residence.
Armed with search warrants around 15-20 IT sleuths, arrived in a mini-bus escorted by a Goa police team and descended on Mickky’s residence around 7.30 am when the MLA was still asleep. The IT officials then went about their work, carrying out a thorough search of the residence for some documents.
A team later left for Cansaulim with Viola’s mother and brother to search her house. While the mother was later allowed to go, the IT sleuths are believed to have interrogated Viola’s brother at Cansaulim.
While the search was going on inside the residence, another team was holed up
at Bresources, Mickky’s business office on the ground floor. At one point, Mickky came down from the residence to his office as per the instructions of the IT officials before returning after a word with the waiting media persons.
At around 3 pm, a six-member team of IT officials later headed to the residence of Mickky’s GVP general secretary Lyndon Monteiro to search his house for some documents. That the IT officials produced the search warrant indicated that the sleuths had come well prepared to conduct a search of Lyndon’s house. Till 8.30 pm, the IT team was still holed up at Lyndon’s residence.
Late Thursday evening, the IT team was preparing to leave Mickky’s residence with bundles of documents which were attached during the search operation.
No details were, however, available regarding the raids and both Sequeira and Salgaonkar did not respond to phone calls.
While news of the raids at the residences of Sequeira and Salgaonkar spread like wildfire across the village, the raids fuelled speculation that Calangute MLA Michael Lobo may have been linked to the raids at the residence of his friend-turned-foe Sequeira.
However, Lobo was quick to deny his hand in the raids by the IT sleuths.
“I am not interested in targeting my political rivals regarding their personal or business matters. I have got nothing to do with the raids by the IT officials at the residences and office premises of Sequeira,” though, Lobo admitted Sequeira is his political rival. “I don’t target my political rivals in personal and business matters, but have been always willing to help in such times,” Lobo told Herald.
