India's federal police on Tuesday searched the homes of former finance minister P. Chidambaram and his son as part of an investigation into suspected corruption during his time in government. The Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) is probing whether a finance company owned by Chidambaram's son Karti helped a client to circumvent limits on foreign investment. The allegations date back to 2008 when his father, now a senior leader of the opposition Congress Party and vocal critic of the current government, was finance minister.

"We are investigating if there was criminal misconduct in (the) grant of foreign investment approval to INX Media," a CBI official said on condition of anonymity. At the time, foreign investments were tightly regulated, and Karti Chidambaram's company is alleged to have helped INX Media bring in money from overseas. Police also raided the former home of INX Media founder Peter Mukerjea, who is in jail on charges of murder related to the death of his stepdaughter. Mukerjea was one of India's leading media magnates before his arrest in 2015 and is a former chief executive of media behemoth Star India.

Copyright Agence France-Presse, 2017