The Task Force sleuths on Tuesday nabbed three persons, including an income-tax consultant, for claiming I-T returns to the tune of about Rs 25 lakh by submitting forged documents. The East Zone police arrested P. Ananda Reddy, 34, a tax consultant, P. Laxminarayana, 35, a farmer, and Vivekananda Reddy from Kukatpally. The three filed about 160 I-T returns under fictitious names and addresses in order to obtain tax deducted at source (TDS) refund orders to the tune of Rs 1.5 crore. They had received 60 refund orders amounting to Rs 60 lakh and withdrew Rs 25 lakh from it and distributed it among themselves.
According to police commissioner A.K. Khan, the hi-tech fraud involves obtaining PAN cards by producing fake documents and then opening bank accounts using the PAN cards. “He (Ananda Reddy) fabricates TDS certificates of his clients without their knowledge by simply changing the name of the assessee and the PAN number using a whitener on the original bank challan of clients, and submits the same to obtain the refund of tax on the fictitious names,” he explained.
The three file I-T returns by preparing fake and forged documents and obtain refund orders subsequently by “managing” post offices and couriers. “The actual I-T assessee was also getting his amount. They used to change name, PAN number and claim the money, which means two refunds were being claimed against a single return on two different PAN cards,” the commissioner said. The cops recovered Rs 2.2 lakh in cash, a laptop, 26 cheques, 13 ATM cards, six PAN cards and eight cellphones from the accused.