Raid raj

Income tax investigators have turned up at the offices of Deccan Chargers Sporting Ventures Limited,owned by the Deccan Chronicle; at the Barakhamba Road office in Delhi of GMR Sports,the company through which the infrastructure giant GMR owns the Delhi Daredevils; at the office in Lucknows Aliganj where the Sahara empire supervises,among other things,the preparations for Punes new IPL team; at Vijay Mallyas Royal Challengers Sports Private Limited; at Shah Rukh Khans Red Chillies,part-owner of the Kolkata team indeed,at pretty much all the major IPL offices. Why,precisely? Because IPL is a hotbed for benami registration,money laundering? But does that imply that wholesale raids are permissible? Is a mere perception enough for business-disrupting activity of this sort? Is it not necessary to do some hard investigative work first,rather than to view public anger as a warrant for harassment?

This takes us back to the bad old days of the raid raj for example,when V.P. Singh was finance minister when the income tax department could be used as a tool in a class war,or political infighting,or outright harassment. There are no shortcuts here. The Indian people have come to understand the complicity of our politics in crickets mis-administration: they will not be fooled by merely unleashing the forces of the coercive state on all and sundry. They need answers,they will expect a thorough,transparent investigation and they will recognise,and not forgive,harassment by the state without due cause.

There is indeed a danger that an attempt to clean up the IPL will take on a dangerously anti-free enterprise tone. It is all too easy to slip into an easy,old-fashioned attack on money,or to make the claim that if a company is registered in a low-tax jurisdiction it is automatically up to no good. Such a claim is not borne out by facts; and those who would make such a claim muddy the waters alarmingly,jeopardising both the clean-up effort and Indian crickets future. The government organs conducting the investigation must remember that they are in the spotlight: they will be expected to,in exemplary fashion,make clear the basis for any action. Otherwise,many will fail to be convinced of their effectiveness,and the feeling might gain ground that they are little more than a diversion,a sop to public anger. And that anger will just grow.