I-T dept slaps AAP with Rs 30 cr tax notice over undisclosed funds

New Delhi: The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) was on Monday served a notice of Rs 30.67 crore by the income-tax department over allegedly undisclosed donations received by it, a move Delhi chief minister Arvind Kejriwal dubbed as a “height of political vendetta”.

“All these were accounted for and shown in books of accounts. This is a height of political vendetta,” said Mr Kejriwal tweeted.

Mr Kejriwal, himself a former taxman, tweeted, “In the history of India, all donations to a political party have been declared illegal. All these were accounted for and shown in books of accounts. This is a height of political vendetta.”

The notice said that the party had not recorded full details of 461 donors who had given a total of Rs 6.26 crore, with each donation exceeding Rs 20,000. The AAP was also accused of not disclosing donations on its website.

Dubbing the I-T notice as “bogus” and “vindictive action”, the ruling AAP said that the party’s “revolution” was being targeted using different government agencies.

“The I-T department has declared the complete amount of donations we received as illegal and has put it under the category of taxable income although we have maintained the records of each paisa that we received from donors,” AAP treasurer Deepak Bajpai told the media.

Suspended AAP leader Kapil Mishra took a dig on twitter and said, “You submitted different details to EC, different one to IT and (were) caught taking hawala money.”

The I-T notice said that the AAP had not disclosed income of Rs 13.16 crore and that its total taxable income calculated by it was Rs 68.44 crore for fiscal 2014-15 and 2015-16. The notice said that the money received as donation in its bank was not recorded in the account books.

Party leader Raghav Chadha tweeted: “Only political party that maintains 100 per cent propriety, transparency and compliance in its funding is being targeted yet again. Centre’s vendetta comes out as an all-out war on this political toddler called AAP as they declare all our donations illegal.”

Mr Bajpai dismissed the charges, saying the party had been maintaining books of accounts and other documents (related to contributions in excess of Rs 20,000) under Section 13A of the Income Tax Act. “We have been submitting reports to the Election Commission about the donations received as per the law,” he said.