New Delhi, March 7 (IANS) The anti-evasion branch of the Central Goods and Services Tax (CGST) Commissionerate in Meerut has busted a syndicate that fraudulently claimed input tax credit of Rs 1,048 crore by issuing fake invoices for the supply of goods in the name of 232 bogus firms that were shown to be registered at various places in the country.
Five bank accounts used to park the proceeds of crime by the syndicate have been provisionally attached.
Three persons have been arrested so far for being perpetrators and conspirators in the creation of bogus firms and fake invoices to siphon off money, according to a Finance Ministry statement issued on Thursday.
The total value of the goods shown to be supplied through fake bills in the names of these shell companies is around Rs 5,842 crore.
The investigation was carried out through various analytical tools such as the E-way Comprehensive Portal, Advait and Business Intelligence and Fraud Analytics (BIFA).
The probe revealed that these 232 bogus firms were operated by mastermind Praveen Kumar, who filed the GST returns for all the fake firms. Apart from the common mobile number, which was used to create and manage 91 firms, 10 more mobile phones, and three laptops were impounded from Kumar’s possession.
During the investigation, it came to light that Full Fledged Money Changer Companies (FFMCs) were used for parking/routing of funds generated through fraudulently passed on ITC. Further investigation revealed bulk purchases of around Rs 1,120 crore from two such FFMCs from other FFMCs.
However, no record of further disposal/receipt of the said foreign currency has been recovered during searches. The owners/directors of these two FFMCs could also not produce any record or details of the ultimate recipient of the foreign currency.
None of the firms that issued invoices were found in existence.
However, two beneficiary firms that had availed ITC on the strength of fake invoices were found to be existing. Further investigation into these beneficiary firms revealed that to justify the fake purchases as genuine, they made payments to two accounts belonging to two forex companies engaged in sales and purchase of foreign currency only, and did not deal in the supply of goods/services.
However, various beneficiaries of fake ITC have transferred money to these accounts, purportedly to justify their fake purchase. The accounts used to carry out these fake transactions were provisionally attached under Section 83 of the CGST Act, 2017.
–IANS
sps/arm
Disclaimer
The information contained in this website is for general information purposes only. The information is provided by TodayIndia.news and while we endeavour to keep the information up to date and correct, we make no representations or warranties of any kind, express or implied, about the completeness, accuracy, reliability, suitability or availability with respect to the website or the information, products, services, or related graphics contained on the website for any purpose. Any reliance you place on such information is therefore strictly at your own risk.
In no event will we be liable for any loss or damage including without limitation, indirect or consequential loss or damage, or any loss or damage whatsoever arising from loss of data or profits arising out of, or in connection with, the use of this website.
Through this website you are able to link to other websites which are not under the control of TodayIndia.news We have no control over the nature, content and availability of those sites. The inclusion of any links does not necessarily imply a recommendation or endorse the views expressed within them.
Every effort is made to keep the website up and running smoothly. However, TodayIndia.news takes no responsibility for, and will not be liable for, the website being temporarily unavailable due to technical issues beyond our control.
For any legal details or query please visit original source link given with news or click on Go to Source.
Our translation service aims to offer the most accurate translation possible and we rarely experience any issues with news post. However, as the translation is carried out by third part tool there is a possibility for error to cause the occasional inaccuracy. We therefore require you to accept this disclaimer before confirming any translation news with us.
If you are not willing to accept this disclaimer then we recommend reading news post in its original language.
