Taxmen go after Amarinder Singh over foreign assets

New Delhi: The income tax department has filed a chargesheet against Punjab Congress chief Captain Amarinder Singh. This pertains to a probe against him and his son, Raninder Singh, in a case of alleged untaxed foreign assets. Turning the issue into a political hot potato, Captain Amarinder Singh hit out at Union finance Minister Arun Jaitley, tweeting “I challenged Arun Jaitley to fight by-elections in Amritsar and this is how he responds. So predictable!”

Captain Amarinder Singh had defeated Mr Jaitley from Amritsar Lok Sabha seat in the 2014 Lok Sabha elections. And he resigned from the Amritsar seat after the Sutlej Yamuna Link decision in November. After the demonetisation, he had once again dared the finance minister to contest from Amritsar Lok Sabha by election and view it as a referendum on the demonetisation.

The case came out when the I-T department received information about Raninder Singh allegedly holding the offshore account in Switzerland as part of details received by the Central Board of Direct Taxes from its French counterparts in 2011.

The department had also detected the movement of funds to Switzerland and creation of a trust and a few subsidiaries in the tax haven of British Virgin Islands, allegedly by Raninder Singh. Both captain Amarinder Singh and Raninder Singh have denied any wrongdoing and called the charges motivated. Earlier this year, Raninder Singh was also quizzed by the Enforcement Directorate officials.