This Article is From Mar 19, 2019

Ahead Of Polls, Election Body Appoints Special Expenditure Observers

Two retired Indian Revenue Services officers of the Income Tax Department have been appointed special expenditure observers by the Election Commission.

Ahead Of Polls, Election Body Appoints Special Expenditure Observers

The two officers will monitor intelligence inputs and also supervise complaints.

New Delhi:

The Election Commission today appointed two retired Indian Revenue Services officers of the Income Tax Department as special expenditure observers for the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.

The poll panel said it has appointed Shailendra Handa and Madhu Mahajan to "supervise and monitor work done by election machinery and ensure stringent and effective enforcement action" in cases where instances of usage of black money and illegal inducements to lure voters is detected.

Shailendra Handa, a 1980-batch IRS officer, has worked as the director of I-T investigations in Delhi and as the additional director general of the National Academy of Direct Taxes in Nagpur. Madhu Mahajan (1982 batch) has served as the DG investigations in Jaipur and has also worked in Tamil Nadu.

The two officers will monitor intelligence inputs and also supervise complaints received through the C-Vigil app, brought by the EC for the people to send to it video-based complaints of bribery of voters, and check instances that vitiate the election process.

It said the officers have supervised many successful search and seizure actions leading to detection of tax evasion in "complicated" cases during their stint with the tax department.

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