The Enforcement Directorate (ED) on Friday conducted searches at multiple premises related to DMK MP Kathir Anand and his father and water resources minister Durai Murugan in a 2019 Income Tax case registered against Anand after ₹11.48 crore was seized from his residence, just two weeks before the parliamentary elections.

ED sleuths conducted searches in Vellore in northern Tamil Nadu, where the father and son hail from, police said. “The searches covered their family residence, a college owned by them,” an officer said.

Another DMK functionary “Pooncholai” Srinivasan linked to them in the 2019 case was also under the scanner. The 11.48 crore was seized from Srinivasan’s relative Damodaran (full name not available) back in 2019 which was allegedly seen as “cash for votes”. The case against Anand, Srinivasan and Damodaran is under trial in a court in Vellore.

Durai Murugan met chief minister MK Stalin over the development. “I am not aware (of any raids). I know only what you all know,” Durai Murugan told reporters in Chennai before he met Stalin.

Following the seizure, which were bundles of notes packed inside plastic packets, the Election Commission of India (ECI) cancelled elections in the Vellore parliamentary seat in 2019. The ECI had then said that they detected a “systematic design” by the father and son to influence voters in the constituency during the election process and accused them of shifting a large amount of cash out of the premises of their education institution, Kingston College and concluded that these are “unlawful activities”.

Anand is now a two-time MP from Vellore after he won a second term in the 2024 parliamentary elections.

Besides this, at the time Income Tax officials had seized ₹137 crore in unaccounted cash from across the state days ahead of the Lok Sabha and assembly bypolls. The ED did not release a statement on the searches.