Back₹1,000 crore in undisclosed assets found in Lalit raids
The search was conducted at the office of the trust, which runs the institutions, homes of trustees and key employees of the groupThe department said in a statement without naming the hotel group that searches were held in 13 premises in the National Capital Region on 19 January
PremiumNEW DELHI : The Income Tax department has unearthed undisclosed foreign assets worth over ₹1,000 crore from the Bharat Hotels group, which runs a chain of hotels under the Lalit Hotels brand, and over ₹500 crore of undisclosed income from a Tamil Nadu-based group running educational institutions.
The department said in a statement without naming the hotel group that searches were held in 13 premises in the National Capital Region on 19 January. A government official, requesting anonymity, confirmed to Mint the involvement of the Bharat Hotels group. The search revealed that a large amount of black money was stashed abroad through trusts formed in the early 1990s in tax havens, the statement claimed.
It added that the investigation led to the detection of undisclosed foreign assets of over ₹1,000 crore, apart from domestic tax evasion of more than ₹35 crore. A case may be filed under the Black Money Act, 2015, and under the Income Tax Act, 1961. An email query to the hotel group remained unanswered till press time.
In a separate statement, the tax department said searches on a group that runs a large number of schools and colleges in Chennai and Madurai regions have led to admission of ₹532 crore as undisclosed income. It also said around ₹2 crore in unaccounted cash was seized. The search was conducted at the office of the trust, which runs the institutions, homes of trustees and key employees of the group. Operations were carried out at 64 places across the state.
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