‘2 city builders hid income’

Two prominent city builders have admitted to having concealed income of Rs 140 crore.

Two prominent city builders have admitted to having concealed income of Rs 140 crore.

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Sources in the Income-Tax (I-T) department claimed the construction firms, Keystone Realtors Private Limited of Rustomjee group and Evershine Builders Private Limited, made this disclosure to the income tax (I-T) department during raids on 24 premises of the companies and their owners in Mumbai, Thane and Virar on Wednesday and Thursday.

However, Boman R Irani, chairperson and managing director of Rustomjee group, and Rajkumar Ludhani of Evershine builders denied that their companies had disclosed the concealed income.

A senior I-T officer, requesting anonymity because he is not authorised to speak to the media, said the raids were conducted after the department received information that they took part payments in cash while selling their residential and commercial projects.

However, this money received was not shown in the books of accounts as income, the officer alleged.

The two companies were covered simultaneously because they had some joint venture projects. They are specifically investigating the partnership arrangement between the groups in a residential project in Virar.

“Their records did not show the income they were actually earning,” the officer said. He alleged that the companies were also inflating expenditure to reduce profit that helped them in paying lower amount of tax.

The I-T department is still scrutinising the bulk of documents seized during the raids to find out if there is further undisclosed income. During the raid, they had recovered a large amount of finance and accounts related documents and computer records.

Officials from the department will go through last six years’ returns filed by these companies and their owners to verify if the income declared in these years was actual.

“Besides collecting tax [on the concealed income], we will calculate the amount of interest and penalty to be levied on these companies for hiding income,” the officer said.