Income Tax dept finds unaccounted transactions over Rs 1K cr during searches

New Delhi, Aug 3:  The Income Tax Department on Tuesday said it had carried out a search and seizure operation on July 20 on the premises of a prominent business conglomerate engaged in diversified fields of textiles, chemicals, packaging, real estate and education.

The search action has resulted in unearthing unaccounted transactions exceeding Rs 1,000 crore.

So far, unaccounted cash of Rs 24 crore and unexplained jewellery, bullion etc. valued at Rs 20 crore have been seized during the course of search.

The official said that search action covered a total of 58 premises, spread across Kheda, Ahmedabad, Mumbai, Hyderabad and Kolkata.

"As a result of the search operation, various incriminating evidences in the form of documents and digital data have been found and seized. These evidence reveal that the group has been engaged in large scale tax evasion by adopting various methods, including, by way of unaccounted cash sales outside the books of account, booking of bogus purchases and on-money receipts from real estate transactions," said the official.

The official further said that the group has also been found involved in layering of unaccounted sums through share premium from Kolkata-based shell companies. Certain instances of unaccounted income generated through cash based 'sarafi' (unsecured) advances made have also been found.

It was also found that the group has been involved in profiteering through manipulation of share prices of its listed companies through operators.

Evidence seized also reveal that the group has been siphoning off funds through fictitious entities for personal use of promoters, officials said.