Cong MLA Khaira alleges ₹44k-cr tax evasion scam
SAYS DUE VALUE ADDED TAX WAS NOT PAID BY SOME UNSCRUPULOUS DEALERS FOR THE GOODS THAT WERE BROUGHT TO PUNJAB, SEEKS INQUIRY BY CAG
CHANDIGARH : Congress MLA Sukhpal Singh Khaira has urged Punjab chief minister Bhagwant Mann to order an inquiry into a “tax evasion scam” of over ₹ 44,000 crore.
However, Principal Secretary (Home Affairs) Anurag Verma refuted the allegations as baseless.
In a letter to the CM, the Bholath MLA sought to bring to his notice a “massive scam” of about ₹ 44,000 crore related to goods that arrived in Punjab from 2009 to 2012 and said this was brought to his knowledge by former deputy excise and taxation commissioner Y S Matta.
Khaira, who was addressing a press conference along with Matta here, said for the goods, which were brought to Punjab, the due value added tax was not paid by some unscrupulous dealers.
Khaira said Matta had information that unscrupulous tax evading dealers of Punjab were importing goods worth crores of rupees through containers at Dhandari Kalan dry port in Ludhiana.
He claimed that Matta had even shared this information with the then excise and taxation commissioner (ETC) Anurag Verma, who is now the principal secretary. Matta was asked to share this information to the director, economic intelligence unit (Eiu)-cum-director enforcement, said Khaira.
However, he said that the EIU was supposed to tally the data of imports with the returns of the dealers of Punjab and where the import data did not tally with the returns.
CAG should conduct inquiry, says Khaira
Khaira demanded that in view of the alleged loot of VAT, an inquiry by the Comptroller Auditor General of India be ordered.
Khaira said as per RTI reply, the ETTSA (excise & taxation technical agency) of the excise & taxation department has all the import data of VAT 35 and VAT 36.
“Hence the verification of the data which amounted to ₹ 44,989 crore as admitted by Mohit Tewari, IRS, before the high court in PIL No 231 of 2019 filed by Capt YS Matta,” said Khaira.
Verma refutes allegations
Meanwhile, Principal Secretary Anurag Verma said Matta himself had remained in charge of five districts as the joint director (investigation), Bathinda, and another five districts as the DETC, Amritsar.
“Had there been some tax evasion, why didn’t he himself detect a single case in these 10 districts out of this data,” said Verma in a statement.
Whatever information was given by Matta to the Economic Intelligence Unit (EIU), discrepancies in only three cases were detected.
“As ETC, I gave instructions for taking strict action in these cases. However, when these dealers were confronted with these discrepancies, they produced their books of account showing that they had fully reflected the imports in their books, Verma said.
Hence, the taxation officers concerned concluded that no tax evasion had been made,” said Verma.
Verma said as per the EIU report submitted to him, the quality of data brought by Matta was very poor.
Department verified data, says Verma
Verma said the department had undertaken a massive exercise of verification of the data provided by Matta and had found that out of ₹ 44,000 crore worth of goods, transactions related to ₹ 43,900 crore had been duly recorded by dealers in their books.
Only a discrepancy of ₹ 95 crore with maximum possible tax liability of ₹ 5 crore was left, which was under verification, said Verma.
Excise and taxation department has filed an affidavit in the court, stating these facts and saying that Matta has wasted the time of the department and should be burdened with exemplary costs, he said.