Wednesday, Apr 24, 2024 | Last Update : 01:13 PM IST
Income-Tax found stash worth Rs 19,000 crore
Mr Jaitley said there is no official estimation of black money stashed outside the country.
New Delhi: The Income-Tax department has detected over Rs 19,000 crore in black money following investigations into global leaks including HSBC account holders in Switzerland, the government said on Friday.
Finance minister Arun Jaitley said investigations into information, put into public domain by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), pertaining to about 700 Indian persons allegedly linked to offshore entities based in no tax or low tax jurisdiction, have led to detection of more than Rs 11,010 crore of credits in undisclosed foreign accounts.
“72 prosecution complaints in 31 such cases have been filed before the criminal courts,” he informed the Lok Sabha.
The ICIJ claims to have a cache of nearly 2.5 million files detailing offshore holdings of people and companies in more than 170 countries that “has cracked open the secrets of more than 120,000 offshore companies and trusts, exposing hidden dealings of politicians, con men and the mega-rich the world over.”
The government constituted a multi-agency group (MAG) in April 2016 for facilitation coordinated and speedy investigation in the cases of Indian persons allegedly having undisclosed foreign assets and whose names were reportedly included in Panama papers leak.
He further said that information on 628 Indian persons holding bank accounts in HSBC bank in Switzerland was received from the government of France under the Double Taxation Avoidance Convention between India and France.
