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The Income Tax Department said on Saturday that the government has issued refunds of over ₹1.14 lakh crore to more than 1.97 crore taxpayers in the first five months of the current financial year. According to a Income Tax Department tweet, “CBDT issues refunds of over ₹1.14 lakh crore to more than 1.97 crore taxpayers between 1st April, 2022 to 31st Aug, 2022."
Notably, income tax refunds of ₹61,252 crore have been issued in 1,96,00,998 cases and corporate tax refunds of ₹53,158 crore have been issued in 1,46,871 cases, the Income Tax Department said.
Meanwhile, in another development, the Income Tax Department raided 28 premises spread in West Bengal and Jharkhand belonging to a prominent Kolkata-based business group engaged in the manufacturing of power transmission and distribution structures, steel structures, steel ERW pipes, and polymer products among others, Union Finance Ministry said on Thursday.
The search and seizure operation by the Income Tax Department was carried out on 24th August 2022 and during the course of the search operation, various methods of tax evasion adopted by the group were unearthed, according to ANI report. The Finance Ministry said in a statement said, “a large number of incriminating evidence in the form of documents and digital data demonstrating booking of bogus expenditure and undisclosed cash sales has been found."
Moreover, evidence of the use of unaccounted cash for the acquisition of immovable property and unaccounted cash loans, etc. have also been found and seized. A preliminary analysis of seized evidence reveals that several shell companies have been utilised by the group to provide accommodation entries to its flagship concerns. These shell entities have been found to have routed back the unaccounted money in the guise of share capital/unsecured loan into the business of the group.
In addition, accommodation entries by an entry operator through a web of numerous shell companies aggregating to more than ₹150 crore have also been detected. The search action has, so far, led to the detection of a total unaccounted income of more than ₹250 crore. Further investigations are in progress, the ministry said.
(With inputs from ANI)