The Central Bureau of Investigation is investigating a scam wherein fraudulent income tax refunds to the tune of Rs 263 crore were issued. The agency on Sunday registered an offence on charges of criminal conspiracy, cheating and forgery against an I-T official, a Mumbai company and its official and three others for their alleged involvement in the scam.
According to the CBI, anonymous information was received by the joint commissioner of income tax in Mumbai, regarding the bogus issuance of refunds in the case of a company in Fort, Mumbai, for assessment years 2007-’08 and 2008-’09. On his directions, the department scrutinised the details of the refunds issued to the said taxpayer company.
“It has come to light that various refunds were issued between November 2019 to November 2020 on the ITD system after manipulating and increasing the amount of tax deducted at source (TDS) as against the genuine claim of TDS made by the said company. It was also found that TDS credit had been deliberately manipulated on the ITD system and refunds not due to the assessee have been fraudulently issued,” said a CBI officer.
As per the I-T officials, from the records it was seen that the assessee had, in their ITR, mentioned the details of its bank account in Mumbai. On November 13, 2019, an additional account of a bank in Panvel, in the name of another company, the proprietary concern of an individual, was added to the ITD system and all the refunds were credited into it….
