I-T dept detects Rs 1.64 crore in cash during raids in Andhra, Telangana

New Delhi, Jan 10:  The Income Tax Department said on Monday that it has detected unaccounted cash transactions of Rs 800 crore in raids during the past five days, which were conducted at the premises of three real estate firms based in Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.

The firms were engaged in the business of land development as well as construction activities in the town of Kurnool (Andhra Pradesh) and other mofussil areas of Telangana and Andhra Pradesh.

The raids started on January 5 and went on till Monday.

"So far, the search action has led to the seizure of unaccounted cash worth Rs 1.64 crore. The searches have resulted in the detection of unaccounted cash transactions to the tune of Rs 800 crore," said an IT official.

More than two-dozen premises were covered in the search operations in Kurnool, Ananthapur, Kadapa, Nandyal and Bellary.

An I-T official said that during the course of the search operations, several incriminating documents were recovered by the I-T team.

"Digital data was seized from a specialised software application as well as from other electronic gadgets. It has been found that in the case of one of the assessee groups, it was using a software which has been systematically modified to eliminate the unaccounted cash element of the consideration received and to record in the regular books of account the sale consideration that matches with registered sale price," said the IT official.

These groups were found to be accepting cash over and above the registered value of the properties. Such unaccounted cash was used for payments of on-money towards the purchase of lands and incurring other expenditure.