I-T dept raids city firm, unearths unaccounted ₹1k cr

I-T dept raids city firm, unearths unaccounted ₹1k cr

TIMES NEWS NETWORK

Chennai:08.11.2020  

The income tax department searched five locations in Chennai and Madurai on November 4 in a case pertaining to a Chennaibased IT infrastructure group. Unaccounted income to the tune of ₹1,000 crore was found, an official release by the income tax department stated.

The I-T department said it unearthed evidence relating to investments in a Singapore-registered company. The shareholding of the particular company is held by two others. One of them is the group which was raided while the other is a subsidiary of a major infrastructure development and financing group. The I-T department said the company raided had a 72% shareholding despite investing a nominal amount. The rest was held by the infrastructure major. “This resulted in benefit of almost seven crore Singapore dollars or ₹200 crore and wasn’t disclosed,” it said.

“Proceedings will be initiated under Black Money Act, 2015. The present value of the investment exceeds ₹354 crore,” the I-T department said. It also stated that five shell companies had been acquired by the group which were used to siphon off ₹337 crore from the main group company by raising bogus bills. The I-T department said it found evidence regarding allotmentof preference shares worth ₹150 crorein 2009 in the group company bypassing accounting entries to project inflated capital to obtain funds from banks. Allotment of another ₹150 crore worth preference shares in 2015 from funds from group companies, who in turn took loans/entries, is being examined.

During the search, officials found the group borrowed from banks on interest and diverted them to other group firms free of interest for investments in properties. The total interest disallowance on this count was about₹423 crore, the release said.

The search also revealed the group had purchased about 800 acres of land, in the names of various shell companies from the funds providedby the main group.Applicability of the Prohibition of Benami Property Transactions Act, 1988 to these transactions is being examine