An NRI working in Dubai heard something from his family in Mumbai that he never expected to.

A distressed family called him up to say that the Income Tax department had sent a notice that he had to pay a ‘pending’ amount of Rs.2.84 crore for his income of Rs.13.8 crore, earned between 2019 and 2022. The family, suspecting fraud, immediately reported the matter to the police. They feared that the man’s PAN card must have been forged by someone to open a bank account from which the business transactions amounting to such a huge sum could have happened.

Soon after this, the man’s chartered accountant traced the money dealings connected with his PAN to a bank’s current account for a business named Cultural Traders. The Dubai NRI claimed that he had nothing to do with the company and its transactions. Investigations by the police led them to someone operating the bank account. A case of forgery has been registered against that individual.

The NRI’s daughter had earlier said in her complaint: “We got to know through information gathered from the Income Tax department about two photos and two different signatures with the name of my father in the transactions using his PAN card. When we approached the IT department, they did not help us in sharing details despite informing them about the fraud.”

However, police are on the case and further investigations are under way. – Illustration by freepik – editor@nrifocus.com