Vikash Sharma

Rourkela: A major racket involved in Goods and Services Tax (GST) evasion was unearthed in Odisha with the arrest of two businessmen from Rourkela on Thursday. The accused have been identified as Amit Beriwal and Subhash Swain.

GST Commissioner, Sushil Kumar Lohani informed that both Amit and Subhash had created a network and generated invoices for procurement or sale of goods and availing input tax credits.

“Through 28 fake firms, the duo availed Rs 89 crore bogus input tax credit and passed on Rs 123 crore input tax credit for which the exchequer incurred a loss of around Rs 123 crore. The exact quantum of loss will be ascertained only after our officers start probing individual cases,” said Lohani.

According to Lohani, the duo had created 28 fake firms by taking signatures, photographs of innocent people against whom dealership registrations were made and bank accounts were opened. To avoid suspicion, the kingpins were frequently depositing and withdrawing money to show regular transactions.

Though the fake firms were registered in different districts, all their bank accounts were with some banks in Rourkela which led to the detection of the racket.

"It is suspected that all such transactions were being done to sale stolen scrap materials illegally outside the state,” Lohani said adding that so far seven persons have been arrested in connection with the fraud which was first busted in the month of November last year.

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