Rs. 1.1lakh crore GST dent from invoice fraud

The government has registered over 26,250 cases of GST invoice fraud across the country, with the estimated amount detected pegged at Rs. 1,15,457 crore between 2018-19 and 2022-23, the finance ministry informed the Lok Sabha.

Responding to a question, junior minister for finance Pankaj Chaudhary said that so far, 1239persons have been arrested and the realisation from these cases is a little over 10,000 crore. Official data showed that with 5,021 cases, involving a “detected amount” of Rs. 30,000 crore, Maharashtra was on top of the list. Gujarat (4,486) had the second highest number of cases, while Delhi (Rs. 14,00 crore) had the second highest detection.

The minister said between July 2017 and June 2023, the government had identified 5,070 cases where fraudulent GST registration had taken place by misusing Aadhaar and PAN. These cases involved illegal benefits of over Rs. 27,400 crore.