Dabur Boss among 3 names disclosed by Govt before SC

New Delhi: The Centre on Monday disclosed the names of three persons who stashed away black money in foreign banks to the Supreme Court. The Government will disclose more names of account holders to the court as and when the prosecution in the case begins. According to PTI, Pradip Burman of the Dabur India group is among the names mentioned in affidavit submitted before the Supreme Court. The others named are Goa-based Radha Timblo and bullion trader Pankaj Chimanlal Lodhiya.

However, Dabur has said in a statement that Burman’s account is legal and it is “unfortunate” that every foreign account holder is being painted with the same brush. 

“We wish to state that this account was opened when he was an NRI, and was legally allowed to open this account. We have followed all the laws and the complete details regarding the account have been voluntarily, and as per law, filed with the Income Tax Department, and appropriate taxes paid, wherever applicable,” the statement said.
 

The Supreme Court, based on a petition by noted lawyer Ram Jethmalani, has created a special committee to look at how to recover black money. But the government had told the Supreme Court that it could not reveal the names received from other countries as it would violate the tax treaties with those countries.

The issue had come under the spotlight again after Congress claimed BJP’s pre-poll promise of bringing back black money to India within 100 days of coming to power was bluster.

Last week, Finance Minister Arun Jaitley warned Congress that it would face “embarrassment” because “a big name” from the party is on the list of Indians who hold illicit foreign bank accounts. Congress had called it an attempted blackmail.

Jaitley’s predecessor and Congress leader P Chidambaram said it would be the individual who would be embarrassed and not the party. “These are individual transgressions,” he said in an exclusive interview to NDTV.

In April, while Chidambaram was Finance Minister, a list of Indians with bank accounts in Liechtenstein was given to the Supreme Court, but both the previous UPA government and the current NDA government said the names must be kept confidential for now.

Jaitley had said tax treaties ban the disclosure of names at preliminary stages of inquiry. In many cases, the investigations were close to completion and the names would then be shared with the Supreme Court, at which point, they would become public via the media. Chidambaram had said legally, it was the correct position.

 

(With PTI inputs)