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    Man earning Rs 7,000 gets tax notice to explain Rs 134 core transactions

    Synopsis

    “I was hardly 21 when these transactions were made. I had not been to Mumbai or Gujarat in 2011 or 2012. I was then working with a private firm in Indore, earning Rs 7,000 a month, which is non-taxable,” said Ravi Gupta.

    money
    (This story originally appeared in on Jan 16, 2020)
    BHOPAL: A 29-year-old youth from Bhind district of Madhya Pradesh is in shock after being handed an income-tax notice and told to explain transactions of Rs 134 crore made on a business account opened with his PAN number in Mumbai in 2011-12. Ravi Gupta says he had a salary of Rs 7,000 in those days, has no idea how the account was opened, and believes it to be a case of money laundering, which should be probed.

    He says an even bigger shock awaited him when he began his own investigation into the firm — it led him to a few steps from the offices of fugitive jeweller Mehul Choksi and his nephew Nirav Modi, co-accused in the Rs 12,700-crore Punjab National Bank (PNB) fraud. Gupta alleged that the transactions were made by a Gujarat-based diamond trading company.

    A senior I-T official said Gupta can file a complaint and seek a probe. Gupta, a resident of Bhind’s Mohana, has been told that transactions of Rs 134 crore were made in the account of the company with a private bank's branch in Mumbai between September 9, 2011, and February 13, 2012. The PAN card linked with this company belongs to Gupta.

    “I was hardly 21 when these transactions were made. I had not been to Mumbai or Gujarat in 2011 or 2012. I was then working with a private firm in Indore, earning Rs 7,000 a month, which is non-taxable,” Gupta told TOI. “I have written to MP cyber cell, Maharashtra Police, PMO and I-T officers to clear me of this tax recovery case.”

    He received the first tax notice on March 30, 2019, and told that his income for 2011-12 fiscal was taxable. “I ignored it since my salary that year was not taxable. Then, I got another one in July. Rattled, I began taking leave to conduct my own investigation. I started collecting details of the case,” said Gupta. He says he went to income-tax offices in Mumbai to tell them that he isn’t at fault and that the account was not his. “Now, the I-T department has threatened to attach my properties to recover the dues,” he said.

    Gupta was summoned by I-T in December and told to bring account details, account opening form, PAN card, copy account verification form, service tax registration, TIN registration and firm registration in Gujarat. “I told them that I had nothing to do with the diamond company. The account had only my PAN card, that too with a forged signature. They should investigate how transactions of over Rs 100 crore were made from an account that didn’t have a local address,” Gupta said.

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    (Your legal guide on estate planning, inheritance, will and more.)

    Download The Economic Times News App to get Daily Market Updates & Live Business News.

    ...more
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