The Income Tax Department, on Wednesday, detected excess reporting of the now defunct Rs. 500 and Rs. 1000 notes to the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), by certain Cooperative Banks.
As per the Income Tax sources, the Directorate of Income tax (Investigation) of Pune and Mumbai, during a survey conducted at Cooperative Banks, detected an unexplained difference between the old Specified Bank Notes (SBN) reported to the RBI and the physical stock found.
In Pune, the reported amount was pegged at Rs. 242 crore, however the physical stock was at Rs. 141 crore.
Similarly, the tax authorities found excess amount of old SBNs of about Rs. 11.89 crore in Mumbai.
The discrepancy was immediately brought to the notice of the RBI, following which it issued a circular directing all the banks to deposit the SBNs collected till December 30, to the RBI chest by December 31.
On the basis of investigation, the Income Tax Department suspected that a possible window of misuse across the country was plugged by certain Cooperative Banks.
Disclaimer: No Business Standard Journalist was involved in creation of this content