Excise official writes to dept on scams unearthed : The Tribune India

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Excise official writes to dept on scams unearthed

BATHINDA: Deputy Excise and Taxation Commissioner (Appeals), Ferozepur Division, Captain YS Matta has written to the Punjab Excise and Taxation Commissioner pointing to the failure of the department to take action against those tax evaders who were exposed by him.



Bharat Khanna

Tribune News Service

Bathinda, December 20

Deputy Excise and Taxation Commissioner (Appeals), Ferozepur Division, Captain YS Matta has written to the Punjab Excise and Taxation Commissioner pointing to the failure of the department to take action against those tax evaders who were exposed by him. The tax evasion related to sale and purchase tax, VAT and giving of wrong input tax credits.

Captain Matta had also marked a copy of the letter to the Prime Minister, Chief Justice of India and the CBI Director following which the department sprung into action and marked an inquiry into the alleged scams.

Captain Matta had pointed out cases relating to numerous firms including M/s Milkfood Ltd, Bahadurgarh, amounting to Rs 475 crores, M/s Haldi Ram and Company, C and F agents in Punjab whose tax evasion amounted to Rs 28 crores, M/s Bathinda Chemical Ltd, Bathinda, tax evasion amounting to Rs 45 crores, dealers of M/s Kirloskar Copeland Ltd, amounting to Rs 4 crore, M/s Ram Rakha and Company, Jalandhar, with tax evasion amounting to Rs 7.75 crores and M/s Asian Refrigeration, Jalandhar, amounting to 3.75 crores, Prime Industries, Ludhiana, with Rs 15.20 crore in tax evasion, M/s Samana Roller Flour Mill, Star Resorts, Rajpura, with tax evasion of about Rs 21 lakhs, timber sale by Punjab dealers to Jodhpur firms in Rajasthan, manufacturing wooden handicraft, amounting to tax evasion of more than Rs 30 crores.

Capt Matta highlighted irregularities in the Indian Railways (Freight and Marketing) from the year 2009 to 2012 amounting to Rs 4,115 crores. He was then serving as Joint Director, Investigations, Ferozepur Division. In his letter, he had also suspected threat to his life.

Captain Matta had mentioned in the letter that the state excise department had suspected the role of Punjab minister Anil Joshi in the M/s Haldi Ram tax evasion case.

In December this year, Captain YS Matta had exposed a tax evasion of Rs 2.1 crores by three rice millers who had evaded VAT and then had shown the wrong input tax credit (ITC). Input Tax credit (ITC) is the amount paid by the dealer on purchase of a commodity for which a dealer is entitled to claim the credit at a later stage from the excise department.

Anurag Verma, Commissioner, Punjab Excise and Taxation Department said, “I have instructed the Director, Investigations, of our department to probe the alleged scams exposed by Captain Matta. I am astonished why he did not raise these scams within the stipulated time-frame of three years as our department can investigate scams that have not crossed a period of three years. The scams raised by the DETC (Appeals) a few days before his retirement are older than ten years in which the investigation could become difficult. If there was any pressure of seniors or politicians on Captain Matta, he should have brought it to our notice.”

When asked why the department had failed to act on the Railways tax evasion scam in 2012, he said, “When Captain Matta had exposed the scam, I was not the commissioner and it was not brought to my knowledge later.”

Captain Matta agreed having written a letter to his department and the Prime Minister besides others and said, “A number of scams were exposed by me but no action was taken by the department for some reasons. I would not comment any more on this.”

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