Hyderabad: Income Tax Department recovers cash of over Rs 142 crore during raids

Ministry of Finance announced on Saturday that the Income Tax Department based in Hyderabad conducted search and seizure operations in a pharmaceutical company on October 6 and seized Rs 142.87 crore worth of unaccounted cash. The Ministry of Finance further said that the unaccounted income is estimated to be valued at Rs 550 crore. The statement read, "This Pharmaceutical group is engaged in the business of manufacturing of intermediates, Active Pharmaceutical Ingredients (APIs) and formulations. The majority of the products are exported to foreign countries i.e. USA, Europe, Dubai and other African countries.”

As per the statement, there were multiple searches conducted at more than 50 locations in six. The IT officials were informed about the hideouts, where they seized even more unaccounted cash and the unofficial records. The officials also seized several bank lockers stacked with unaccounted money. The ministry said, "Incriminating evidence in the form of digital media, pen drives, documents, etc. have been found and seized. Incriminating digital evidence was gathered from SAP @ ERP software maintained by the assessee group."

The IT department found a pattern of suspicious purchases made through remote companies or non-existent entities and also found out that the purchase values were inflated to include black money into the accounts. The ministry also said, “Further investigations and quantification of undisclosed income detected is in progress.” The IT officials also found incriminating evidence of cash payments for the purchase of lands. The ministry also said that there were illegal practices involved in the company's books as land purchased by related parties was mentioned much below government registration value.

IT department’s recent aggressive approach

Several raids were conducted by the Income Tax Department in some major states such as Maharashtra, Karnataka and Uttar Pradesh across the country. The IT department was suspicious that there were groups and individuals from various businesses associated with a huge web of undisclosed foreign bank accounts and assets. The finance ministry released a statement saying that these groups/individuals utilised the services of a Dubai-based financial service provider to create a dubious and complex web of foreign companies and trusts based in tax havens such as Mauritius, the UAE, BVI, Gibraltar, etc. to hold their unaccounted assets. 

(With PIB inputs)

Image: PTI