IT search operations yield Rs 23 crore

PUNE, July 19: The Directorate of Income Tax (Investigation), Pune division has mopped up a whopping Rs. 23.43 crore through search and s...

PUNE, July 19: The Directorate of Income Tax (Investigation), Pune division has mopped up a whopping Rs. 23.43 crore through search and seizure operations in 34 different cases in the financial year 1997-98.

These include unaccounted assets worth Rs. 5.88 crore and unaccounted gold jewellry and bullion worth Rs. 2.37 crore, and unaccounted share certificates and undisclosed fixed deposits of approximately Rs. 15 crore. A major highlight of these seizure operations was the admission of concealment of Rs. 55 crore of income.

This was disclosed recently by the Director General of Income Tax (Investigation), Western Region, R K Pathania who was here for a two day visit to review the performance of the Directorate of Investigation, Pune.

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Speaking to mediapersons here, Pathania who is in-charge of investigation wings in the state of Maharashtra (except Mumbai), Gujarat and Rajasthan, said the department has chalked out a plan of action so as to detect the cases of tax evasion and encourage better tax compliance.

During the first three-and-half months of the current financial year, searches were conducted in eight groups of cases at Pune, Kalyan, Nashik and Nagpur which were executed by teams of officials headed by officers at the rank of the additional director of income tax. Unaccounted assets of Rs. 1.70 crore and jewellry and bullion worth Rs. 17 lakh were recovered. The undisclosed income admitted by the assesses in these two groups was Rs. 10.46 crore.

The investigation wing of the income tax department has conducted massive raids in Nagpur, Pune, Nasik and Kalyan and claim to have unearthed undisclosed income to the tune of over Rs. 10 crore during the first three- and-a-half months of the current financial year.