JD(S) leader R Prabhakar Reddy, who has contested both Assembly and Lok Sabha elections, was arrested on Wednesday in Bengaluru for allegedly evading taxes, sources said. He was later sent to the Parappana Agrahara Central Prison in the city. He had recently contested 2014 Lok Sabha elections from Bengaluru Rural seat.
The politician is no stranger to controversies. He was recently arrested by the Central Crime Branch in connection with land grabbing cases. Police in 2016 too, had registered as many as 22 FIRs against him related to forgery, fraud and criminal conspiracy. More recently, he had also allegedly threatened another real estate builder Babu Reddy by barging into his Bannerghatta Road residence in mid-2018.
Incidentally, the Income Tax Department in a release said that it has made its third arrest in recent days without mentioning the name of the accused.
The release read, “A prominent taxpayer who is well known in the city and had once contested State Assembly and Parliament elections for a prominent political party was arrested today for default in paying taxes. A search and seizure operation was conducted in the case of the tax defaulter. The tax defaulter has contested in Vidhan Sabha Elections of Karnataka twice and also contested in Lok Sabha Elections.”
The release added, “The tax defaulter had not paid taxes or filed return of income as per time allowed under Income Tax Act, 1961. The tax defaulter after the search and seizure operation admitted income in view of the evidences unearthed during the search proceedings. The total taxes payable by the tax defaulter was determined at Rs. 5.40 crore. The tax defaulter did not pay these taxes. He has not even paid the taxes on the income admitted voluntarily in the return filed after search and seizure operations. Various attempts were made by the Department by means of issue of notices and recovery proceedings and all other means.”
The statement also said that IT sleuths found that the tax defaulter was involved in various real estate transactions but did not use funds generated out of real estate business to pay tax and also it was noticed that the tax defaulter had not filed returns of income for subsequent years even though he had taxable income.
He will be prosecuted by the Economic Offences Court, I-T Department said.