The Supreme Court- appointed Special Investigation Team (SIT) has flagged cricket betting as one of the main sources of generation of black money. In a report SIT submitted to the Supreme Court (SC) on Tuesday, it has also said that 339 accounts mentioned in HSBC bank have a total of Rs6,400 crore in them.
The link between black money and cricket betting has been well-known, but the SIT has underlined its extent by quoting a FICCI report which estimated that a staggering amount of Rs3 lakh crore was generated in the process.
The SIT said that its probe into 628 entries/people having accounts in HSBC bank, showed that there was no amount mentioned in 289 cases while a sum of Rs237 crore has been recovered as tax and penalties on black money.
“large amounts of black money are being transacted every year. As per the FICCI report, it comes to more than Rs3 lakh crore. This needs to be controlled,” the SIT said in its brief summary to a Bench headed by Chief Justice Hl Dattu.
The SIT report was based on tracing and bringing unaccounted wealth from tax havens. The panel agreed with the suggestion of senior advocate Ram Jethmalani, who has filed the PIl on black money, that every candidate should file an affidavit before the election that he or she does not hold any illegal money abroad and in the event of contrary findings, such people be barred from electoral politics. The same yardstick could be made applicable to senior appointees in the Government like RBI Governor, SEBI Chairman, CBI Director, etc., the panel said.
In its third report, the SIT has given the summary of steps taken, the results achieved and suggestions which can be adopted to bring illegal money back to the country.
The SIT said it is still waiting for the response of various Government departments on its suggestions like mandatorily mentioning the PAN in the invoice for sale and purchase of goods worth Rs1 lakh or more.
The panel sought a direction from the court to the authority for implementation of its earlier suggestion that five additional courts be set up in Mumbai to deal with such cases.
Dealing with the investigation carried so far in respect of the 628 entries/ persons having accounts in HSBC bank, for which information came from France, it said that in 289 cases, no amount is mentioned.
“Amount is mentioned in 339 cases. (a) Total of peak balance is approx. USD 1.9 billion (i.E Rs 8624 crore). (B) Rs 2,224 is the total amount that of repeated/ duplicated entries on account of there being joint account holders/ beneficiaries. (C) Hence, net amount comes to Rs 6,400 crore,” the report said.
The report further said, “Amount of Rs 237 crores approx. is recovered on tax and penalties demand raised. However, it does not include the amount paid by self assessment tax in certain cases.”
It also said that besides the 628 cases, additional information is being gathered in other 605 matters which are currently under investigation. It also said that on the basis of report of International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), inquiries have been conducted and the names of 430 resident Indians out of the total 534 Indians have been traced.
The panel further said that the IT returns in these cases shows that such transactions were not disclosed to the Income Tax department. “During the course of investigation, 176 persons have admitted their relationship with such offshore entities/ transactions. Further inquiry is under progress,” it said.
It said that the CBDT has been able to “detect unaccounted income to the tune of Rs 7,078 crore during 2013-14 and corresponding figure is Rs 4,456.96 crore for 2014-15 (till Feb. 15)”.
It also quoted a report of Global Financial Integrity (GFI) which revealed that illicit financial flow from India was “much more” and remained uncontrolled. The country ranks fourth in the list of 142 nations on the illegal money flow, it said.