Court drops I-T case proceedings against Emaar MGF MD Gupta

A court here on Tuesday dropped the proceedings against Managing Director of real estate major Emaar MGF Shravan Gupta after he informed it that the Delhi High court has quashed summons issued against him in a case filed by the Income Tax (I-T) department for allegedly not furnishing details of his bank accounts.

Additional Chief Metropolitan Magistrate Devendra Kumar Sharma noted that the high court in its April 6 order has quashed the summons issued against Gupta. "In this view, proceedings qua Shravan Gupta are dropped," the court said. The high court has said that the trial court's order of summoning Gupta as accused was liable to be quashed on "technical reason". The high court's verdict came on Gupta's plea challenging the trial court's order of taking cognisance on the I-T department's complaint filed against him. The trial court had on Febraury 27 summoned as accused Gupta whose name, along with those of others, has allegedly cropped up in the black money case. The I-T department had, in its complaint against Gupta, alleged that he had not filed the income tax return of $1.5 million for financial year 2005-2006 and when questioned and confronted by the department about it, he admitted it. It had alleged that he had later filed the income tax return and declared the amount in his income. 

The department had said that on being asked by it, Gupta had refused to give his bank account details, after which the complaint was filed against him under section 276 D (failure to produce accounts and documents) of the I-T Act. It said that after Gupta's name cropped up in the HSBC Bank list, he had paid  the tax after making a voluntary disclosure.