The Patiala House Court refused to grant bail to a CA allegedly involved in creating fake GST Challans.
The accused, CA Harish Kumar Rampal has been in judicial custody and is 62 years of age and a CA by profession and also having a proprietorship firm under the name & style of Mis Rampal Company Chartered Accountants having its office at Faridabad. The applicant’s firm has been professionally engaged by Ms Starcrest Services Pvt. Ltd. And the said company is in the business of providing personal security services and solutions to its clients.
The department conducted a search on the premises M/s Starcrest Services Pvt. Ltd. where Sanjay Singh Tanwar and Ankur Gupta were not present.
The department submitted that the company voluntarily deposited Rs. 1,33,22.042 with GSTIN portal only for which they submitted DRC03 to the applicant. It was submitted that the statements of applicants were voluntary and have not been retracted.
The department said that the applicant did not appear before the department and after his arrest he has not deposited any amount with the department. The applicant intentionally got admitted in the hospital just to avoid appearing before the department.
During July, 2017 to November 2020 the company deposited Rs.17.44 crore to the bank account of applicant ‘s firm and out of which only Rs. 4,62,76.328/- were deposited with the government exchequer.
It was submitted that the applicant was involved in a fake GST challan and GSTR-3B return which was provided to the company as proof of GST payments and the GST payment was misappropriated to the tune of Rs. 12.67 crore as the said differential amount was made up through ITC in the GSTR-3B return submitted to the company. Even the employees of the applicant admitted that they created these forged challans on the directions of the applicant. It is submitted that the applicant instead of depositing Rs. 12.67 crore to the government misappropriated it.
The court while rejecting the bail application noted that the plea of rendering cooperation to the department by the accused appears to be baseless as it is apparent that he tried to avoid investigation under the garb of medical treatment in hospitals The conduct of the accused is writ large that despite being statutory auditor he misappropriated the GST amount and simultaneously misled M/s Starcrest Services Pvt. Lid through generations of forged documents.
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