Trader held for Rs. 68 crore GST evasion by CGST’s preventive department, Rajkot

GST department, Rajkot, arrested a brass and copper scrap trader in Jamnagar for alleged tax evasion of Rs 67.72 crore, the proprietor of the scrap trading firm, had taken GST registration since 2017 but was involved in issuing and receiving fake invoices for the last two years.

Brass attracts an 18% tax. The bogus bills were used to claim input tax credit, bring down manufacturing costs, and evade income tax by showing more expense.

After raising invoices, traders are required to generate an e-way bill for the transportation of goods. But in this case, the vehicles shown in the e-way bill neither passed through checkposts nor were goods carriers.

“The buyer of the fake invoice claims ITC based on the invoice. The payments are exchanged through a banking channel to show that the entries are genuine but the receiver of the payment gives back the money through angadiya after deducting his commission,” said an officer.