62 firms got GST registration on fake documents

62 businesses that registered for GST on the basis of forged documents have been rounded up by the Central GST Commissionerate in Indore. The companies were engaged in the practise of creating phoney invoices and obtaining input tac credits worth millions of rupees. Under the competent leadership of Chief Commissioner, Bhopal Shri Navneet Goyal and Principal Commissioner Shri Partha Roy Chowdhury, the Central GST Commissionerate, Indore has launched a campaign against false registrations as part of its ongoing operation against criminals and as a preventative measure to reduce the threat of fake registrations being registered. All questionable GST registrations were selected for thorough examination and verification using Artificial Intelligence methods and human intervention.

Data analytics was used in the first round of this operation to identify 62 GSTINs/Firms that initially appeared suspicious among freshly registered GST registrants. It was discovered that the aforementioned businesses had obtained their GST registration numbers via the use of falsified or false documentation and were issuing fraudulent invoices to pass off fake Input Tax Credits (ITC) without producing any goods.

Physical verification was done on all 62 suspect companies. Out of these firms, 60 were discovered to be non-existent, and their registrations have been cancelled. 27 of these 60 fictitious companies have received ITC totaling Rs 59.6 crores and transferred Rs 60.2 crores. An investigation of these companies has been started. Additionally, the remaining 33 firms have already been terminated before they could register any additional fraudulent ITCs. The fraudsters may have exploited these companies to transfer the bogus ITC if the Central GST teams hadn’t stepped in.

The Central GST Commissionerate in Indore, India, has identified 75 cases of tax fraud so far in the current financial year 2022–2023 as a result of ongoing operations. In the upcoming months, the Commissionerate will intensify its efforts to eliminate any potential false or invalid GST registrations.