ITR refund scam by CA busted in Bengaluru

A city-based chartered accountant (CA) was busted by the tax officers for his alleged involvement in an income tax refund scam, which led to nearly Rs 18 crore worth of fraudulent tax claims, officials said on Thursday.

"A CA from the city, when searched on Wednesday by the Income Tax Investigation Directorate officials, was found to be instrumental in filing false income tax returns and making fraud refund claims," a statement from the state's Director General of Income Tax (Investigation) said.

The CA had filed fraudulent tax claims of several employees from the city working at companies like IBM, Biocon, Infosys, ICICI Bank, Thomson Reuters and Cisco, the statement noted.

"The employees, who have resorted to such fraudulent claim of refunds by filing revised returns of their individual incomes, were questioned, along with the CA," it added.

The chartered accountant had reportedly filed nearly 1,000 tax returns with "loss from house property".

It aggregated to loss claim of Rs 18 crore, the statement added.

"The details of the persons who had filed the revised returns, claiming bogus house property loss have been seized. Further enquiry into the tax refunds claimed by the chartered accountant and his clients is going on".

Necessary action would be taken against both the CA and the persons who have claimed wrong refunds under the provisions of the Income Tax Act, the tax officials asserted.

--IANS

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