PTI
PARIS
A massive leak of 11.5 million tax documents has exposed the secret offshore dealings of aides to several world leaders and celebrities including over 500 Indians being named in leaked ‘Panama Papers’ for alleged offshore holdings.
An investigation into the documents by more than 100 media groups, described as one of the largest such probes in history, revealed the hidden offshore dealings in the assets of around 140 political figures worldwide.
With 500 Indians being named in leaked ‘’Panama Papers’’, India formed a multi-agency group to monitor exposes in this regard and vowed to take action against all “unlawful” accounts held abroad.
The documents, from around 214,000 offshore entities covering almost 40 years, came from Mossack Fonseca, a Panama-based law firm with offices in more than 35 countries.
Finance Minister Arun Jaitley told reporters that Prime Minister Narendra Modi discussed the issue with him this morning and on his advise the group has been set up comprising agencies like CBDT, RBI and FIU (Financial Intelligence Unit).
The Special Investigation Team (SIT) on black money also said it will investigate thoroughly the reported secret list exposed by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).
“The multi-agency group will comprise various government agencies -- the CBDT, FIU, FT&TR (Foreign Tax and Tax Research) and RBI. They will continuously monitor these (accounts) and whichever accounts are found to be unlawful, strict action as per existing laws will be taken,” Jaitley said.
According to a national report, the list included well-known actor and his daughter-in-law, Amitabh Bachchan Continued from P1
and Aishwarya Rai, realtor, KP Singh, Indiabulls owner Sameer Gehlaut, Mumbai ganglord late Iqbal Mirchi, Vinod Adani of Adani Group, Goa-based industrialist Anil Salgaocar, Corporate lawyer Harish Salve, Jehangir Soli Sorabjee, physician Omkar Kanwar, chairman of Apollo Tyres among others.
The report, however, said most of those named denied any wrongdoing.
The report said Onkar Kanwar, Chairman of Apollo Group, and his family members floated an offshore entity in British Virgin Islands in 2010 and two trusts in 2014.
Reacting to it, an authorised spokesperson for the Kanwar family said, “India lawfully permits foreign investments in accordance with certain regulations. Any investment abroad, that the Kanwar family may have, is in due compliance with the Indian laws, where applicable, including making disclosures wherever required.
“Much of the family members mentioned are NRIs. They are covered by other nation’’s permissible laws for their foreign investments and are not covered by Indian laws and restrictions on residents in matters such as Income Tax and RBI.”
