Zeenews Bureau
New Delhi: Rejecting Patanjali Yog Peeth’s contention of ‘nil’ income, the Income-Tax department is reportedly set to cancel the registration of Baba Ramdev’s trust as a charitable organisation and withdraw all exemptions granted to it.
The Patanjali trust and other affiliate organisations have so far enjoyed exemption under Section 12 (a) of the Income-Tax Act; however, the I-T department on scrutiny of accounts pegged its taxable income at Rs 72.37 crore.
As per the Financial Express, the I-T department on scrutiny of records for the assessment year 2009-2010 found out that the trust was involved in a number of commercial and trading activities.
The Patanjali Trust showed revenue outflow of Rs 8.71 crore against an income of Rs 74.74 crore – a surplus of Rs 66.03 crore. I-T rules mandate that exemption is provided only to those trusts that spend at least 85% of its income for charity.
Among the sources of income for the trust are the Rs 14.75 crore received as membership fees in 2009-2010, Rs 15.41 crore from holding yoga camps (VIP coupon goes for Rs 2,100 and diamond coupon for Rs 1,100).
Also, the trust was found to have received Rs 13.69 crore as ‘anonymous donation’ while it admitted to have received only Rs 1.07 crore as such donations.
The I-T department has reportedly found serious discrepancies even in the disaster relief funds managed by the trust. For the year under assessment, Rs 4.36 crore was shown as donations for the fund, of which Rs 1.58 crore was claimed to have been spent on Bihar flood victims.
The business daily further claimed that tax officials are now in the process of despatching final penalty notices and cancellation of registration orders.
A self proclaimed anti-corruption crusader, Baba Ramdev had recently held a mass rally in Delhi demanding that the government bring back black money to the country.
First Published: Tuesday, August 28, 2012, 12:05