Over one lakh Noida residents on income tax department radar

The department issues notices to the defaulters; most of them hostel and paying guest owners.

More than one lakh residents of Noida and Greater Noida have been issued notice by the income tax department for alleged violations such as not filing returns and not disclosing PAN account number while carrying out financial transactions.

Officials said the department has also found a surge in the purchase of luxury cars, costing Rs 25 lakh and above, in the satellite city. Many of those who bought these cars neither filed the IT returns nor submitted their PAN numbers. (Sunil Ghosh/HT Photo)

The defaulters include many residents who were earlier into farming, said officials of the department.

These are residents who were once farmers but received hefty compensation from the government after their land was acquired by the government. With the compensation money, they have constructed big houses near private universities and are running hostel and paying guest (PG) facilities for students there, the officials said.

The department has found that some of these PGs and hostel have done transactions running into crores.

A senior official at the Noida IT department office said many of these PG/hostel owners have bought luxury cars and done transactions worth lakhs of rupees with or without disclosing their permanent account number (PAN). Some have bought land without filing the income tax returns.

Officials in the department said the estimated cost of tax theft in Noida is more than Rs 50 crore.

“The central office of the IT department in Delhi issued seven lakh notices. The Noida office has issued notices to 25,000 residents who declared their PAN account number during transactions and over 90,000 who did not declare the number during transactions,” said a senior IT department official.

Many of these defaulters are owners of paying guest facilities and hostels near private universities of Noida, officials said.

“There are thousands of people in Noida who were once farmers. But after their land was acquired by the government and they received hefty compensations, they do not fall in the category of farmers. With the compensation money, they have constructed big houses and rented rooms to students of private universities,” said a senior IT department official.

The department claims that owner of a paying guest accommodation or hostel with 100 rooms make around Rs 2-2.5 crore every month. Most of them do not declare their PAN account number while carrying out transactions. Three to four students live in a room and pay at least Rs 10,000- Rs13,000 each.

Officials said the department has also found a surge in the purchase of luxury cars, costing Rs 25 lakh and above, in the satellite city. Many of those who bought these cars neither filed the IT returns nor submitted their PAN numbers.

The department recently conducted raid at a famous timber and woodwork company in Sector 9 after allegedly finding discrepancies in its transactions.

“The survey in the timber company was done by a team of Range 2 of Noida led by joint commissioner BB Garg. Deputy commissioner Mithilesh Shukla completed the survey in an overnight operation,” said a department official.

Owner of the timber company had dues of Rs 2.5 crore, the department stated. He surrendered the dues on Wednesday morning.