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PIL: Taxman must give 2011 assessment order

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A social activist has filed an application seeking that the Bombay high court ask a senior official from the income tax department to produce an assessment order of December 2011 which shows that private firms paid unexplained “overheads”, totalling nearly Rs44 crore, to facilitate the building of the Ghodzari branch canal in Vidarbha.

The application was filed by Pravin Wategaonkar in his public interest litigation, seeking a probe into the alleged Rs70,000-crore irrigation scam.

Wategaonkar prays that the HC direct AS Marathe, deputy I-T commissioner, Kolhapur, to produce the assessment order of December 27, 2011, and other documents pertaining to Mahalaxmi Infraprojects Ltd (MIL).

Two months ago, activist Medha Patkar of the National Alliance of People’s Movement had alleged that a dam contractor had bribed top NCP, BJP and Congress leaders as well as state irrigation department officials for the Gosikhurd national project in Vidarbha.

Her allegations were based on the income tax order passed by Marathe. The order purportedly shows payments made to “Dada”, “AP”, “GAD”, “SD” and “MG”. Patkar alleged that ‘Dada’ and ‘AP’ refer to deputy chief minister Ajit Pawar while the others are BJP leaders Nitin Gadkari and Gopinath Munde and former Congress MLA Sunil Deshmukh.

Marathe had passed the order after conducting a search in September 2009 at the residence of a technical director of MIL.

Wategaonkar had filed a PIL early this year seeking inquiry into cases where “idle charges” were paid to contractors, while withholding dues of the project-affected people and payments made towards forest land/forest clearances, etc, in Jamda and other Konkan Irrigation Development Corporation (KIDC) projects till 2011-12.

The PIL also states that there have been massive delays in irrigation projects in the Konkan region, leading to huge cost overruns. It alleges violation of rules to favour certain private contractors.

Name game
The order purportedly shows payments made to “Dada”, “AP”, “GAD”, “SD” and “MG”. ‘Dada’ and ‘AP’ allegedly refer to deputy CM Ajit Pawar while the others are Nitin Gadkari, Gopinath Munde and MLA Sunil Deshmukh.

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