New Delhi, March 22 -- Amid allegations of former Karnataka chief minister B S Yeddyurappa having paid Rs 1,800 crore to BJP leaders, the Income Tax Department Friday issued a clarification saying its one-and-half-year-old searches yielding "loose sheets" of papers containing "numerical entries" against "some individual names" appear to be doubtful as the originals are not available.

The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) in a statement said it had recovered "xerox copy" of "diary pages" of Karnataka Legislative Assembly of 2009 from Congress leader D K Shivakumar during a search action on August 2, 2017.

Shivakumar in a statement to the tax department stated that these were "a copy of the diary, written by B S Yeddyurappa, and the pa...