BENGALURU: The Income Tax Department on Thursday said that their search and seizure operation on nine major trusts which are running educational institutes including medical colleges in Bengaluru and Mangaluru has unearthed acceptance of illegal capitation fees of Rs. 402.78 crore along with investments in foreign nations.
A release by the department through PIB says that so far, the evidence gathered indicates that the money has been accepted as illegal capitation fees by manipulating the online admission process. The search operation, on Wednesday at 56 locations across Karnataka and Kerala, according to the statement, has found evidence for cash-for-seat malpractices for admission to MBBS, BDS and Post Graduate seats in the form of notebooks, handwritten diaries, MS Excel sheets containing the details of cash received from students/brokers for admission in these colleges for various years.
“It was also observed that the management, faculty, staff, meritorious students and brokers are working in close nexus to manipulate the online admission process,” the statement said. The officials found that the transparent selection process to medical colleges through NEET has been subverted by Trustees and key persons running these Medical Colleges in collusion with agents/brokers and some students who got high ranks in NEET Examination.
The college managements were admitting less meritorious candidate after collecting huge sums as capitation fee/donations in cash which are illegal under the Karnataka Educational Institutions (Prohibition of Capitation Fee) Act,1984. The department, interestingly, also found evidence indicating that one of the medical colleges has some sort of “package arrangement” for passing management quota students in written examination and viva voce for a fixed sum ranging from Rs. 1 lakh to Rs. 2 lakh.
The colleges had also diverted the cash collected for non-charitable purposes by the Trustees which is clearly in violation of Sec 12AA of the Income-tax Act, 1961. And the man had made a large number of investments in immovable properties with huge cash components.
One of the colleges has reportedly diversified into the business of timber/plywood industry and undisclosed foreign assets too. “Searches have resulted in the seizure of cash amounting to Rs. 15.09 crore, gold jewellery of 81 Kg(valued at Rs. 30 crore), 50-carat diamonds and 40 kg of silver in residential premises of the trustees and are prime facie, unexplained. Evidence of undisclosed foreign assets of Rs. 2.39crore in Ghana has also been found apart from evidence of huge investments in 35 Luxury cars in benami names,” the official statement said. Further investigation is in progress.