New Delhi: The Income Tax department
probing alleged irregularities in the funding and bidding of
IPL franchisees has received reports relating to expenses
incurred by franchisees in South Africa where the second
edition of the T20 tournament took place last year.
The reports are being corroborated with the documents
of documents containing bidding and other financial details of
IPL franchisees obtained by the I-T officials during surveys
of offices of various franchisees and IPL Commissioner Lalit
Modi.
Sources said the reports received by the department as
part of the tax agreement between India and South Africa has
been sent by the Financial Intelliegence department of South
Africa.
The reports contain expenditure and investment summary
of all sources and a family-tree format of all entities
related to the IPL sent by the South African authorities.
The department is also tallying the various financial
details including PAN card data, Annual Information Return
(AIR) of the IPL organisers, players, coaches, publicity
companies and others involved in the tournament, the sources
said.
The Mumbai investigation wing of the department is
coordinating with other probe wings of the department.
Sources said that I-T investigators were looking at
matching the transaction reports in connection with search and
survey operations conducted at the offices of Multi-Screen
Media, formerly Sony Entertainment Television, International
Management Group and World Sports Group (WSG), all of which
are closely connected to the Modi-led IPL.
MSM is the telecasting agency of IPL, while WSG is its
marketing arm. IMG is the organising agency of the IPL.
Sources said the department has also received reports
of similar nature from some other countries but refrained
from naming them.
These inputs have been processed and forwarded to the
investigators of the IPL probe.
The top brass of the Finance Ministry, Income Tax
department and financial intelligence sleuths had yesterday
held a closed-door meet in the national capital.
I-T officials including the Director-General of
Investigations in Mumbai flew down here and briefed top CBDT
and Finance Ministry officials about the probe that is now
being carried out across the country on various IPL franchises
and others.
-PTI
