Economy

GST fake invoice fraud: 104 arrested within three weeks

Updated : December 04, 2020 08:08 PM IST

Authorities have arrested 8 fraudsters, booked 65 cases and unearthed 114 fake GSTIN entities

In a bid to ensure that government plugs various loopholes to do away with fake invoice fraud, the Directorate General of GST Intelligence (DGGI) and the CGST Commissionerates within three weeks conducted nationwide drives.

"During the nationwide drives against GST fake invoice frauds, DGGI has arrested so far 104 unscrupulous persons for illegally availing or passing on input tax credit (ITC) fraudulently through fake entities and fly-by-night firms and circular trading," DGGI sources said.

"Today the authorities have arrested 8 fraudsters, booked 65 cases and unearthed 114 fake GSTIN entities. Thereby, in this drive, they have so far booked 1161 cases against 3479 fake GSTIN entities," the same sources quoted above added.

The drives, searches and surveys were conducted in more than 38 cities/metros by now, namely, in Meerut, Bhopal, Jaipur, Bangalore, Delhi, Hyderabad, Bhubaneshwar, Siliguri, Ahmedabad, Lucknow, Kolkata, Kanpur, Nagpur, Chennai, Mumbai, Visakhapatnam, Coimbatore, Surat, Vadodara, Una, Rajkot, Kochi, Gurugram, Pune, Ludhiana, Ranchi, Belagavi, Patna, Guwahati, Raipur, Jammu, Durgapur, Hosur, Bhilai, Jodhpur, Unnao, Indore, and Thane.

Further investigations in these cases are in progress to unravel the network and multiple chains of fake invoices’ benefactors and, also, to ascertain the exact amount of tax evasion and usurpation by these fake entities and fraudsters.

Meanwhile, people in the know of the matter said that some frantic attempts made by a few big masterminds of fake invoice scam to obtain bails at different courts have not succeeded so far despite their hiring of legal bigwigs.

"In Mumbai, the Session Court rejected the bail application of Sunil Ratnakar Gutte, son of a sitting MLA and Managing Director of Sunil Hi-tech, - a kingpin who was arrested on the basis of multiple documentary evidence along with his business associate Mr Vijendra Ranka, in a fake invoice scam worth of Rs. 520 crore of ITC."

GST fake invoice fraud: 104 arrested within three weeks

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