After Dabur, Pepsi faces raids in Nepa

KATHMANDU - Four days after Dabur India’s factory in Nepal was raided by anti-corruption watchdogs over allegations of manufacturing irregularities, another Indian multinational’s corporate office and factory in Kathmandu were raided by revenue officials.

Varun Beverages, the bottler of Pepsi and related soft drinks in India and Nepal, and an associate company of India’s RKJ Group chaired by Ravi Jaipuria, was raided Friday by the newly formed flying squads under the finance ministry that have begun scrutinising corporate houses for evasion of VAT (Value-added Tax), excise duty and other taxes.

Along with Varun, its subsidiary company and the distributor of Budweiser Beer in Nepal, Arctic International, was also raided.

However, the raids failed to unearth any incriminating evidence.

“Our factory in Sinamangal and corporate office in Baluwatar were raided Friday,” Surajan De, CEO of Varun, told IANS. “The factory was given a clean chit and is functioning as usual. Though the search at the corporate office continued till late at night, the squad could not find anything incriminatory.”

De said that since raids had started on many other companies, Varun was not taking it as an untoward incident.

However, given the recent campaign against Indian multinationals, that led to the raid by the Commission of Investigation of Abuse of Authority on the godown of Dabur Nepal Monday, Indian investors were watching the developments closely to see whether it was a routine move or an attack targeting Indian companies.

Last year, Varun and another of its subsidiary companies, Devyani International, opened the first international fast-food chain outlets in Nepal with the inauguration of Pizza Hut and KFC in the capital.

But just a month later, their plans to take the chains to Pokhara city and other locations had to be put on hold after labour unrest fomented by the opposition Maoist partys trade union.

(Sudeshna Sarkar can be contacted at sudeshna.s@ians.in)