On Thursday (12th October), the Enforcement Directorate (ED) and the Income Tax Department raided four locations, belonging to Santiago Martin aka ‘Lottery Martin’ at Gandhipuram and Vellakinar Pirivu in Coimbatore city of Tamil Nadu.
The raids were conducted as part of the investigation into the Sikkim lottery scam case under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). The four locations include the residence of Lottery Martin, two offices of Martin Group of Companies and the premises of Martin Homeopathy College.
The raids continued from 8 a.m. to 7:30 p.m. on Thursday (12th October). In order to prevent any untoward incident, CISF personnel were deployed at these four places. Searches were also conducted at locations, belonging to the lottery kingpin, in Chennai.
#WATCH | Tamil Nadu: Income Tax raids continue for the second day at the premises of Coimbatore-based businessman Santiago Martin aka ‘Lottery’ Martin, at Vellakinar Pirivu in Coimbatore. pic.twitter.com/gMqzO9u0eD
— ANI (@ANI) October 13, 2023
As per a report by ANI, income tax raids were carried out for the second day at the residence of ‘Lottery Martin’ on Friday (13th October).
The Background of the Case
Santiago Martin is accused of causing a loss of ₹910,29,87,566 (~ ₹910.29 crores) to the Sikkim government through the fraudulent sale of lottery tickets in the State of Kerala between April 1, 2009 and August 31, 2010.
“Martin and his associate companies and entities made unlawful gains with a corresponding loss to the government of Sikkim to the extent of ₹ 910 crore on account of inflating the prize-winning tickets claim for the period from 01.04.2009 to 31.08.2010,” the ED said in a statement in May 2023.
At that time, the central agency seized his movable properties (mutual funds and fixed deposits) worth ₹157.7 crores and documents of immovable properties to the tune of ₹299.16 crores.
In December 2021, the Enforcement Directorate attached ₹19.59 crore worth of his properties under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act. Two years earlier in 2019, raids were conducted by the IT Department on 70 premises of ‘Lottery Martin’ across the country.
A former daily-wage labourer in Yangon in Myanmar, Santiago Martin went on to establish a ₹7000 crore ‘lottery’ business. He has been under the radar of investigative agencies since 2011 for financial fraud and money laundering.
