Rs 11 crore unaccounted assets seized, I-T Department reveals after 2-day raid on Sandalwood stars

After reports of raids at properties in Bengaluru owned by some of Sandalwood’s biggest names, actors Shivarajkumar, Puneeth Rajkumar, Yash and Sudeep and producers Rockline Venkatesh, Vijay Kirigandur, CR Manohar and Jayanna, the Income Tax Department has revealed further details. 

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In an official statement released by the I-T Department, the officials shared that close to 200 officers from Karnataka and Goa region conducted the searches at 21 premises and surveys at five places. It added that the department spent more than three months in making enquiries in order to find the modus operandi of the concerned. 

The statement read, “As many as 180 Officers and officials were mobilised from various places in Karnataka and Goa region for the purpose. The Department conducted discreet enquiries for more than three months before the search and identified the modus operandi and the key players.” 

The searches covered movie production houses, producers, financiers and actors and managed to unearth suppression of income from film distribution, exhibition, sale of various rights, unaccounted cash expenditure on films, unaccounted collections from theatres and evasion of taxes. 

“The Searches have been successful in unearthing evidence of suppression of income from film production distribution and exhibition as well as evidence of unaccounted cash expenditure in the film. In particular evidence of unaccounted theatre collections in cash and consequential evasion of taxes have been found,” the statement noted. 

It added, “Evidence has also been found of suppression of income from the sale of audio, digital and satellite rights, unaccounted cash receipts from distributors, and of expenses from undisclosed and unaccounted sources.” 

The ‘raids’, which lasted for two days, resulted in undisclosed assets worth Rs 11 crore consisting of cash of Rs 2.85 crore and gold jewellery of 25.3 kgs being seized. Evidence presented in front of the persons involved led to the admission of unaccounted income of Rs 109 crore.  

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The statement also revealed that the evidence of diversion of cash collected at the theatres will be shared with other revenue and enforcement agencies and the Investigation Wing will be setting up prosecution cases for tax evasion. 

The department also asked the Sandalwood industry to abide by the accounting standards, pay taxes and make a record of the various transactions.