IT raids on Bahubali Producers

Hyderabad, Nov.11: Tollywood went into jitters as the Income Tax authorities raided the residences and offices of the Producers of multi-crore mega blockbuster Telugu film Bahubali on Friday evening in the wake of the Narendra Modi Government's surgical strike to unearth black money. In a lightning move, the IT authorities swooped on the residences and offices of Shobhu Yarlagadda and Prasad Devineni, producers of Bahubali, the Telugu film which created a record the world over when it was released early this year. Starring Prabhas, Tamanna and Anushka Shetty besides Rana Daggubati, the film earned a niche for itself in film production with breath-taking excellence in cinematography, settings, and technical aspects. Soon after demonetization of 500 and 1000 rupee currency notes, the IT authorities focused their attention on traders, jewellery shops, money changers, hawala operators as news spread that profiteering and tax evasion was continuing unabated by various dubious methods like converting canceled currency notes in an illegal manner. The raids were launched in various parts of the country. As part of the move to unearth stashed cash and also detect evasion of taxes, the IT sleuths seemed to have focused their attention on the film industry. The simultaneous raids on the houses and offices of the producers of Bahubali have sent shockwaves in the film fraternity in Tollywood. Apart from the producers, the IT officials are also expected to focus their attention on some other important persons connected with the movie. The searches were still going on at the time of going to press late in the evening.