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The Income Tax Department carried out searches on 17 March on properties related to a prominent builder and developer group based in Mumbai. Searches were also conducted in properties linked to dealers engaged in the trade of cellphone accessories. In all, 29 premises located in Mumbai were covered under the search operation, while 14 premises were covered under survey action.
The real estate group is developing a commercial mall with with 950 units exclusively for the mobile accessories business. Of these, about 905 of the units were sold from 2017 till date. Information stored in a pen drive found on the searched premises revealed that the builder group has taken an amount of ₹150 crore as on-money receipts over and above the agreement value, which is unaccounted for in the books of accounts on sale of such units. Further, similar evidence of on-money amounting to ₹70 crore has been found in the pen drive pertaining to a residential-cum-commercial project. Cash amounting to ₹5.50 crore has been found and seized from various premises of this group. The receipts of on-money for sale of shops and flats by the builder in various projects recorded in digital form have been seized.
Regarding the dealers engaged in the business of mobile accessories, incriminating evidence was found pertaining to out-of-books sales. The group imports goods from China and sells these goods to various parties all over India. The imports are under-invoiced and payments are made through hawala channels. Thirteen secret godowns containing unaccounted stock have been discovered, wherein the stock is being inventoried and valuation is under progress.
Furthermore, evidence of unaccounted investments in properties by the said dealers amounting to ₹40.5 crore has been detected. Out of this, unaccounted investments worth ₹ 21 crore are against the purchase of units in the said commercial mall. Four undisclosed bank accounts in the names of employees have also been detected, which are used to collect the sale proceeds from the retail vendors of the groups. The total deposits in the bank accounts amount to ₹ 80 crore.
Mobile accessories sector remains unaccounted, says I-T department
This operation has revealed that the entire sector of trading in mobile accessories is largely unaccounted for. The main components are imported from China through Mumbai and Chennai ports. Search has revealed that the dealers are undervaluing the sales and purchases in a major way. The transactions with Chinese counterparts take place through the We-Chat app. The Department has recovered the We-chat messages using forensics.
The information is being verified and collated by the Income Tax department to extract information regarding the quantum and cost of Chinese imports.
Unaccounted cash of ₹5.89 crore has been seized, so far, in this operation. The searches, as yet, have resulted in the detection of undisclosed income of around ₹270 crore. Further investigations and the exercise of valuation of unaccounted stock are in progress.
(Published from PIB)
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