New Delhi: The Income Tax department has scaled up scrutiny of large financial transactions in a drive against tax evasion and terror financing.
The Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT) has conducted searches at four premises in the Kashmir Valley and three in New Delhi belonging to one organization suspected of large scale undisclosed financial transactions, a statement from the tax department said on Wednesday.
Without disclosing details about the organization or the people involved, CBDT said the search yielded credible evidence of large unaccounted cash spending indicating willful attempt to evade tax.
“This action is part of a concerted drive to trace illegal sources of funding that have financed the separatist elements and their activities in the valley," read the CBDT statement.
In a related development, the National Investigation Agency (NIA) also said its teams conducted simultaneous searches at 11 locations in South Kashmir in the “dens of the Jaish-e-Mohammad (JeM)" as part of investigation into terror funding connected to the the 14 February Pulwama attack that killed 40 CRPF personnel.
The Pakistan-based JeM has claimed responsibility of the attack.
“These include searches at the houses of Mudassir Ahmad Khan and Sajjad Bhat (both active terrorists of Jaish-e-Mohammed and key accused in the Pulwama attack). Searches were also conducted in the houses of active ‘over ground workers’ of Jaish-e-Mohammad in Tral, Awantipora and Pulwama areas of South Kashmir. Incriminating materials including diaries containing coded writings were seized," an NIA statement read.
Searches were carried out in the houses of three separatist leaders—Mohd Shaban Dar, Shawkat Maulvi and Yasmine Raza—in a terror funding case.
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