BENGALURU: In a setback to bookies of the Bengaluru Turf Club (BTC), the Karnataka High Court refused to quash the criminal proceedings initiated against them by the CCB, for allegedly not depositing the crores of rupees collected from the punters and bettors towards GST and TDS, before the concerned department.
While dismissing the petition filed by Surya and Co 25 other bookies, Justice S Vishwajith Shetty observed that the allegations against the accused are very serious as they allegedly misappropriated crores of money collected by them, towards payment of GST and TDS. This is one among other allegations. Under the circumstances, the prayer made by the petitioners for quashing the FIR registered against them cannot be granted, he said.
The petitioners have challenged the legality of the crime registered by the CCB before the High Grounds police station for the offences punishable under the provisions of the Karnataka Police Act, 1963, Karnataka Race Betting Act and IPC.
Advocate General Shashikiran Shetty, and additional state public prosecutor BN Jagadeesha contended that the statement of 21 punters disclosed that bookies have collected GST at the rate of 25 percent while collecting the betting amount, and no receipts were issued. The bookies, who have not maintained any record of the winning bettors, have also collected 30 percent TDS amount, they stated before the CCB.
The state government has also submitted that the raid was conducted after the completion of four horse races, and an amount of Rs 3.45 crore was seized. For the period from June 1, 2023, to January 18, 2024, a total of 1,507 races have been conducted in BTC but the total collection shown was only Rs 24.96 crore for the said period. If the average of four races is taken into consideration, the total betting amount for the 1,507 races is Rs 1,302 crores. But the collection shown was Rs 24.96 crore only, to evade tax, the state argued.
The state also submitted that the BTC president has also stated before the CCB that the bookies are not authorised to enter transactions in pencil sheets and the betting cards issued by them are not in the requisite format as they do not even contain tax invoices or GST numbers.