Mother of all GST frauds: Annai Infra probe reveals AP, TS Infra giants role

Hyderabad: The arrest of a Tamil Nadu based businessman in an alleged Rs 450 crore Goods and Services Tax (GST) fraud, has opened Pandora’s box. The names of giant infra companies have come to the fore for their alleged involvement.

According to the confession files (exclusively accessed by NewsMeter) the accused Subramaniam Ashok Kumar, chairman and MD of ‘Annai Infra Developers Limited’- Tamil Nadu, confessed to having helped M/s Afcons Infrastructure, M/s NCC, M/s Navayug, M/s Shapoorji & Pallaomji, M/s L&T and M/s KNR, with fake invoices to the tune of Rs 453 crore.

The accused revealed these names while he was interrogated for his involvement in the alleged Rs 450 crore fake invoice scam unearthed by the Vishakhapatnam GST intelligence sleuths. This is the biggest GST fraud scam detected in Vizag.

On October 16, 2019, the GST sleuths arrested S. Ashok Kumar as his company received and issued fake invoices without the actual supply of services to the tune of Rs 450 crore.

During interrogation, the accused Ashok Kumar was questioned by the GST officials on how and why did his company receive and issue fake invoices.

According to Ashok Kumar’s confession report (a copy in possession with NewsMeter) he said, (verbatim), “ One Maheshwari and Sachin Patrikar have approached me, seeing our IPO proposal. They suggested that they will help our company in improving our turnover by arranging clients (who are all big companies) like M/s NCC, M/s Navayug, M/s Shapoorji & Pallaomji, M/s L&T and M/s KNR. The duo said, the company (referring to Annai Infra developers) can issue service bills against work orders issued in the name of our company so that we can record turnover.”

The man confessed that “While making payment of GST in respect of service bills against work orders issued in the name of our (Annai Infra). Maheshwari and Sachin Patrikar have also arranged GST invoices (fake) in the name of the above companies based on which Annai Infra has availed Input Tax Credit. As per our ‘understanding’, the amount received against the service bills issued by our company from the above clients (big infra companies), has to be immediately paid back, in the name of the above mentioned companies, in whose name we have received GST invoices, after retaining 3 per cent to 5 per cent margin as our expenses including IT TDS deduction, GST portion to be paid in cash on margin amount.”

Annai Infra company produced fake invoiced for these companies when actually there was no movement of goods. Under section 132 of the CGST Act 2018, it is a punishable act, and one is liable for arrest under Section 69 of the CGST Act 2017.”

The accused Ashok Kumar reportedly has submitted the statement showing details of client-wise service bills issued by Annai Infra during the period of November 2018 to August 2019 indicating the breakup of taxable value charged and GST billed on the above named, clients.

The company, ‘Annai Infra Developers Limited’- TN, has reportedly issued service bills with a taxable value of Rs 453.61 crore with a total GST payment of Rs 66. 60 crore to the clients ( Infra Companies ) and against this Ashok Kumar’s company has received a total Input tax credit of Rs 63.80 crore.

The confession of Ashok Kumar led the GST sleuths to probe the alleged involvement of the name companies.

(The version of M/s Afcons Infrastructure, M/s NCC, M/s Navayug, M/s Shapoorji & Pallaomji, M/s L & T and M/s KNR, will be added to the story when we receive reply from.them)