Mumbai, Aug 21 (KNN) The Mumbai Zonal Unit of Directorate General of GST Intelligence, CBIC, (DGGI-MZU) has busted a major input tax credit (ITC) refund fraud case of Rs 118 Crore.

GST Intelligence arrested Santosh Doshi for input tax credit refund fraud. He was controlling and operating 07 companies/ firms viz M/s. Amal Overseas Pvt Ltd, M/s. C-Kluster Expotrade Pvt. Ltd., M/s. Ekon Crystalmerchants Pvt. Ltd., M/s. Meticulous Overseas Pvt. Ltd., M/s. Ninad Overseas Pvt. Ltd., M/s. Parees Overseas Pvt. Ltd., M/s. White Opal Expotrade Pvt. Ltd., the ministry of finance said in a statement.

These companies fraudulently availed Input Tax Credit (ITC) without any supply of goods and services on the strength of bogus invoices and claimed Rs 118 Crore as refund against exports. 

The modus operand involved in this financial fraud was that several dummy units were created in the States of Jharkhand and West Bengal on the basis of forged documents. They passed on the said bogus ITC to several shell trading firms acting as intermediary entities situated in the State of Chhattisgarh.

Further, several units were created as exporting fronts at Pune and Mumbai in the State of Maharashtra to whom the units situated in the State of Chhattisgarh supplied fictitious goods purported to be exported. The exporting units were created merely for the purpose of availing refund in a fraudulent manner.

To nab the mastermind behind the whole channel of financial fraud, DGGI, Mumbai launched an operation, by searching concerned CHAs, CAs, CSs, key persons and freight forwarders and several statements were recorded.

It was revealed that Santosh Doshi, a resident of Pune, Maharashtra, who is also the Managing Director of M/s Masumi Overseas Pvt. Ltd., was actually the promoter and operator of these 07 exporting firms. The accused created a complex web using multiple layers of transactions starting from manufacturers to traders in between and ultimately to exporters to facilitate encashment of accumulated ITC.