The Directorate of Investigations of Income Tax (Karnataka and Goa) have unearthed undisclosed income of Rs. 300 crore from cooperative housing societies which were under the Income Tax Department’s scanner.
The unearthing of such a large amount comes after taxmen conducted search and seizure operations on at least three housing cooperative societies in September and October, said an IT Department release.
While the investigation in the cases of raids is still in progress, the investigation wing, in coordination with the TDS wing and various field offices of the IT Department, has embarked on a thorough investigation of such societies and is in the process of verifying tax evasion issues, the release said.
During the course of investigation, the release said, it was noticed that many societies have neither filed their IT returns nor deducted TDS on various payments made to developers. Substantial cash payments have also been made by the societies, it said.
As part of their probe, IT sleuths had conducted operations in September on the premises of former BJP minister, S.N. Krishnaiah Setty and Srikantdas, brother of yet another former BJP Minister S.A. Ramdas, along with premises of some of their associates.
They were probed for their dealings with the Karnataka Telecom Department Employees Cooperative Society and the Ministry of Communication Employees’ Cooperative Society.
Mr. Srikantdas’s company, S.S. Infrastructure and Mr. Setty’s company, Balaji Krupa Enterprises, develop residential layouts.
The taxmen had also covered several big land developers, including Anjaneyalu Prathipati and Ravi Kumar Reddy, and their associates as part of the probe. In October, a search was conducted at the Telecom Employees’ Housing Cooperative Society.
