BackKhursheed asks Finmin not to tax Satyam’s inflated income
Khursheed asks Finmin not to tax Satyam’s inflated income
PremiumTaxing issues: Salman Khursheed, corporate affairs minister. Manoj Verma/Mint
New Delhi: Corporate affairs minister Salman Khursheed has asked the finance ministry not to tax Satyam Computer Services Ltd—now branded Mahindra Satyam—on the basis of income provided by its disgraced founder B. Ramalinga Raju.
“We have written to finance minister Pranab Mukherjee... knowing that the income disclosed (by Raju) was not reliable, not honest," Khursheed said. “How can the (income-tax) department rely on it and say we don’t care whether it is real income or stated income, we will tax it?"
Mahindra Satyam had requested Khursheed to take up the issue of taxation with the finance ministry, as it would be unjust to tax income that was never there.
In January last year, Raju confessed to fudging the company’s accounts to the tune of Rs7,136 crore and inflating profits. The company had also paid tax on fake income on bank deposits that didn’t exist.
In October last year, the Company Law Board had extended the timeline for Mahindra Satyam to finalize its accounts to 30 June 2010.
After the swindle was unearthed, the government took over the reins of the company and later sold it to Tech Mahindra Ltd, which bought the software firm through an open auction in April 2009.
In July, Mahindra Satyam had approached the CLB seeking an extension of the deadline to restate accounts of the firm from December to 31 March.
The government-appointed board of Satyam had appointed KPMG and Deloitte to audit the books of the information technology firm.
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