GST officials on Monday arrested a man for allegedly floating fake firms and committing Input Tax Credit (ITC) fraud worth Rs 10 crore in Bhubaneswar.
The accused was forwarded to court. Smruti Ranjan Sahu of Bapuji Nagar in the city was operating multiple dummy firms with forged documents. A scrap dealer, Sahu had allegedly opened the firms in the name of economically weaker section people like rickshaw-pullers and other small traders. As many as seven such dummy firms were being run by him in Bhubaneswar and Rourkela. However, all the companies were benami and registered with fake accounts. Sahu had used fake names and identities of gullible persons in a bid to evade tax.
He had shown an annual turnover of Rs 40 crore. He used to pass on fake ITC to his clients in exchange for some commission of the invoice amount, sources said. The tax invoices were issued in the name of bogus entities to avail the ITC.