Tax officials uncover fake GST bills racket

Jaipur: Director General of GST Intelligence (DGGI) busted tax invoice fraud to the tune of Rs 1004 crore and arrested five persons including its mastermind on Sunday in Rajasthan's Jaipur.

While the prime accused has been identified as Vishnu Garg, Mahendra Saini, Pradeep Dayani, Badri Lal Mali and Chartered Accountant Bhagwan Sahai Gupta are the other accused persons.

Rajendra Kumar, ADG, DGGI, while talking to media persons said that the accused have accepted their crimes.

"We have busted a racket of generating fraudulent bills and invoices to claim an input tax credit (ITC) without depositing the actual good and services tax (GST) amount with the government. The gang was also involved in generating GST registration numbers in the names of dead people by using fake address documents," ADG Kumar said.

"The DGGI investigation has revealed that the accused have done the fake business of more than Rs 1004 crores in 4 years through 25 fake firms. The accused have arrested the accused of taking fake input tax credit of Rs 146 crore by issuing fake invoices worth Rs 1004 crore," he said.

"DGGI's investigation has also revealed that Vishnu Garg has issued fake challans without supplying the goods. Apart from this, Vishnu Garg had formed 20 other fake firms which were issuing fake bills. He has violated various provisions related to CGST Act 2017, RGST Act 2017, IGST Act 2017 and its rules. While conducting an investigation against the accused, searches were conducted at the home and office, where several documents have been seized," he added.

Kumar said incriminating documents, unaccounted cash and laptops were seized after simultaneous search operations were conducted in Rajasthan, Madhya Pradesh and Telangana. A total of 25 firms were formed illegally and the total value included in the fake invoice is Rs 1004.34 crore.

The search operations revealed that Jaipur based Vishnu Garg was the mastermind of the racket, who used to generate bills without the actual sale of goods,” Kumar said, adding that he was operating 25 shell companies in the name of his neighbours and employees to generate these bills.

He said further investigations are underway to determine the extent of GST invasion and whether they were trying to take bank loans using fake bills and invoices.