New Delhi: Income Tax officials seized Rs 142 crore in cash during searches at over 50 locations on a leading Hyderabad-based pharmaceutical company across six states. The searches began on Wednesday and documents seized revealed forged and bogus billings, tax evasion and money laundering by the group, sources said.
The company was into manufacturing Covid treatment drugs and exported its medicines to the US, Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Some of the drugs which were in very short supply during the peak of the second wave of the pandemic in April-May are also manufactured by the company and exported.
“During the search, several bank lockers have been found. The searches have resulted in seizure of unexplained cash amounting to Rs 142.87 crore so far.”
“The unaccounted income unearthed is estimated to be in the range of about Rs 550 crore till now,” said the IT department.
An official statement from the department said: “Hideouts were identified where a second set of books of accounts and cash were found. Incriminating evidence in the form of digital media, pen drives, documents have been seized.”
Officials said evidence collected during raids pointed to “purchases made from bogus and non-existent entities and artificial inflation of certain heads of expenditure”. The I-T department also claimed that illegal cash generated from tax evasion was used for purchase of land and other assets.
