Court to hear arguments on notice against bizman in IT case

A Delhi court today said it would next month hear arguments on framing of notice against a businessman in a blackmoney case filed by the Income Tax Department for allegedly not disclosing details of his Swiss bank account.
Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate (ACMM) Pritam Singh fixed August 14 for hearing arguments in the case involving Parminder Singh Kalra, who was earlier granted bail after he appeared before the court in pursuance to summons.
"Put up for arguments on notice on August 14," the court said.
The court had earlier summoned Kalra as accused after taking cognizance of the IT Department's complaint, saying it prima facie disclosed commission of offence under Section 276D (failure to produce accounts and documents) of the Act.

According to the complaint filed for the assessment year 2006-07, a search was carried out at the Delhi residence of Kalra on July 28, 2011.
During search proceedings, Kalra's statement was recorded on oath on August 30, 2011 in which he admitted that he had opened a bank account with HSBC Bank in Zurich, Switzerland in December, 2002 when he had visited there, the complaint said.

It also claimed that the accused had said the information regarding the foreign bank account was not disclosed in his return of income.
The complaint said that during the recording of his statement, Kalra was also shown extract of the information, reflecting balance of USD 20,32,908 (now over Rs 12.8 crore) in May, 2006. To this, he had said the balance was of his income pertaining to previous years.

However, the businessman later wrote a letter to the department and "with an afterthought, retracted from his statement and denied having any bank account outside India", it said.