Keep watch on money flow, Collector Kartikeya Mishra tells bankers

Kakinada: Bankers and I-T department should take serious note of the instructions of the Election Commission of India (ECI) on money transactions during elections duly monitoring at every point, said East Godavari Collector Kartikeya Mishra.

Addressing the meet with bankers and Income Tax officials at Collectorate on Tuesday, the Collector said that the banks should ensure that the vehicles of outsourcing agencies carrying particular bank's cash shall not under any circumstances, carry cash of any third party agencies, except that go to the concerned bank.

The banks should also carry relative documents issued by the banks providing details of the cash released by the bank cash operators to them for filing the cash in to ATMs and delivering cash at other branches.

If these details are not carried properly the flying squads may seize the cash, the Collector told the bankers.

With regard to unusual and suspicious cash withdrawals or deposits exceeding Rs 1 lakh, during the process of elections and unusual transfer of money by RTGS from one bank account to the accounts of several persons, withdrawal or deposit of money exceeding Rs 1 lakh from the account of a political party, the Collector ordered the bankers to provide such information to district level expenditure monitoring committee and to Income Tax officials.

Accordingly, the Collector instructed the Income Tax officials to deal firmly in case of any suspicious withdrawal of large amount of cash.

The Collector also directed I-T officials to keep close surveillance on movement of cash to undisclosed destinations through air, railways, at hotels, farm houses, hawala agents, financial brokers, cash couriers, pawn brokers during elections in the district.

Sumit Kumar Gandhi, nodal officer for MCC, Gopal Naik, N Kalyan Chakravarthi Assistant Commissioners of Income Tax, D Rajamohan, RM, SBI, Dr KVS Prasad, AGM, NABARD, MV Govindarajulu DRO, BV Subrahmanyam, LDM, East Godavari, Ravi Varma, DSP, Kakinada sub-division and others attended.