GST Racket of 461 shell entities claiming Fraudulent ITC of Rs 863 crore busted by DGGI Gurugram

The Gurugram Zonal Unit of the Directorate General of GST Intelligence recently discovered a significant fraud involving 461 shell/fake firms that distributed Rs. 863 crores in illegal ITC. Two significant players, in this case, have so far been detained.

When a search was conducted at a covert office being used for this purpose on the basis of intelligence, the scheme to transfer fraudulent ITC through fictitious shell entities was discovered. The laptops recovered from this covert office had a sizable number of forged, morphed, or fraudulent soft copies of documents including rent agreements, energy bills, aadhar cards, driver’s licences, PAN cards, etc. These documents were utilised to establish and run their fictitious organisations. The forensic analysis of the laptops and other gadgets that were taken from this office eventually led to the discovery of an ITC scam totaling Rs. 863 crore involving false 461 businesses and the arrest of two key operators. According to preliminary investigations, the fake ITC credit eventually made its way to the industry that is especially susceptible to tax evasion, metal and steel.