I-T dept raids 50 locations in crackdown against tax evasion worth Rs 100 crore

In its first major action after the black money disclosure window of PMGKY ended recently, the Income Tax department on Thursday conducted searches at over 50 locations as part of its crackdown against tax evasion to the tune of over Rs 100 crore.

Officials said the first set of raids are being conducted against an Ahmedabad-based real estate and infrastructure player. Tax sleuths, they said, have visited 30 locations in cities like Rajkot, Mumbai, Delhi, Hyderabad and Ahmedabad as part of this action and multiple entities and people have been brought under the action.

This is the first major I-T action after the black money window of the Pradhan Mantri Garib Kalyan Yojna (PMGKY), announced by the government for stash holders to come clean post-demonetisation, came to a close on March 31.

The window had allowed black money holders to declare their illegal wealth by a paying a tax and penalty of about 50 per cent on the undisclosed income.

Also read: Income-Tax dept offices to accept declaration under PMGKY till March 31 midnight

Officials said the taxman had inputs about the said company taking “bogus” entry deposits through alleged shell firms and operators based in Mumbai and Kolkata for fake sub-contract charges and various other expenses totalling over Rs 100 crore.

A similar search has also been conducted in at least 19 locations in and around Pune against a corporate group engaged in “processing and trading of agricultural commodities”.

Officials did not identify the groups stating that the action is still ongoing.

A senior officer of the department said that with the closure of the PMGKY window, all those cases where black money and tax evasion has been detected will be covered aggressively by such actions.

Also read: New ITR form seeks details of all deposits made during demonetisation period between Nov 8 and Dec 30 last year

The collections and declarations under the PMGKY have not been as huge and enthusiastic for the department as the similar black money window of Income Disclosure Scheme (IDS) that had fetched Rs 67,382 crore worth of disclosures.

While there is no official comment from the Income Tax department or its policy-making body, the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) on the total PMGKY declarations, officials indicated it to be around a little over Rs 3,000 crore.