PNS|Vijayawada
The Income Tax department has issued a show-cause notice to Telugu Desam Party (TDP) chief and former Andhra Pradesh chief minister Chandrababu Naidu, asking why an amount of Rs 118 crore, allegedly received by him as kickbacks from some infrastructure companies, should not be treated as ‘undisclosed income’ and be processed as per law. The notice was issued by the Central Circle, Hyderabad, on August 4 after rejecting Naidu’s preliminary objections that the tax proceedings against him could not have been initiated by the Central Circle before the jurisdictional assessing officer undertook the exercise of reassessment of his income for the impugned financial years.
The I-T investigation against Naidu stems from searches carried out on the premises of Manoj Vasudev Pardasany (referred to as MVP in the notice), who, the notice said, was taking part in the tendering process in Andhra Pradesh since December 2017 on behalf of Shapoorji Pallonji & Co. Pvt Ltd (SPCL), and at the premises of Pardasany’s associates in November 2019.
In hie statements, Pardasany admitted to having arranged bogus contacts and work orders for siphoning off of funds by SPCL to generate cash through sham sub-contractor companies, the notice added.
“Several incriminating messages, chats, and Excel sheets have also been recovered from MVP and his associates during search operations which show siphoning off of funds and cash generation by several major infrastructure companies. Delivery of such cash to you (Naidu) has also been unearthed during the course of the search,” it said.
According to the notice, MVP got in touch with Naidu’s personal secretary P Srinivas in August 2016 (when Naidu was CM), who asked him to arrange for funds for the party.
“From the statements of MVP recorded on 01.11.2019 and 05.11.2019, it has been found that funds were siphoned off from projects allocated to SP by the Andhra Pradesh Government without doing any actual work…Apart from Shapoorji Pallonji (SP), funds were also siphoned off from L&T and delivered for use by you through companies such as Phoenix Infra & Pour Trading,” the notice to Naidu stated.
Listing out details of sub-contractors who were allegedly issued bogus work orders, the I-T department alleged that Naidu was the ultimate beneficiary of the payments received by these entities.
Adding up the amount that MVP allegedly siphoned off from various sub-contractor companies and paid to Naidu, the notice stated: “Please state as to why an amount of Rs 118,98,13,2071- for AY 2020-21 should not be treated as your undisclosed income.”
