A chartered accountant has been arrested in Mumbai for allegedly aiding and abetting a businessman in an export fraud of Rs 118 crore. The arrest was recorded by the prevention of smuggling and customs fraud unit of Directorate of Revenue Intelligence (DRI) on Thursday.
In June, the officials had arrested a business man Radha Madhav joint managing director Abhishek Agarwal from Daman, for defrauding the exchequer by taking monetary benefits of imports under a government scheme, but failed to fulfil obligations of exports. Later, his consultant, Ramesh Chavan, who had taken Rs 9 crore from the firm under the pretext of getting an export obligation certificate (EODC) was arrested. DRI had seized Rs 6 crore from his house.
Abhishek submitted the EODC, claiming he had complied with the obligation. DRI found it had exports of only Rs 18 crore, while Rs 118 crore was of “ghost exports”, with no records with Customs. Agarwal sought 10 days to procure records but failed to do so. He said he had engaged Chavan, who gave documents, which DRI said were bogus. “Agarwal said Chavan claimed he can close the EODC by his ‘settings’ and manage an EODC with a third-party export. We will unearth the racket and find other in the syndicate,” an official said
