Govind Sharma
JAMMU, May 9: Income Tax scam worth over Rs 40 lakhs has surfaced in the Government Medical College and Hospital (GMCH), Jammu, where Tax Deductible at Source (TDS) of more than one hundred employees, including doctors and para-medical staff, was allegedly siphoned out by the concerned Accounts Section.
The embezzlement came into light after 117 employees of the Institution were served Income Tax notices for their failure to deposit income tax for the financial year 2013-14.
According to the reliable sources, the Income Tax department recently issued Tax evasion notices to 117 employees including doctors, one of the HODs and other superior staff members of GMCH Jammu for not filing proper income tax returns for the previous financial year.
“Although the TDS was deducted from the salary of these employees by the Accounts Section of the hospital but only a part of that amount was deposited in Income Tax department while a huge amount of about Rs 40 lakh was embezzled by some accounts officials prompting the Income Tax department to serve notices of tax evasion to the innocent employees”, they added.
The sources said that since then these employees are approaching the concerned Accounts Office time and again, who alleged that this is a human error, mismatch of PAN or mismatch of amount and will be rectified soon but after the lapse of over four months they failed to rectify the accounts of these employees, who despite being innocent have been made scapegoat by the accounts officials of the hospital.
“The Form 16 issued by the Accounts Section of the hospital is the testimony of the innocence of these doctors and raises fingers on the role of the accounts officials of the hospital, who are responsible for depositing the tax deducted by them in the Income tax department”, sources added.
A doctor on the condition of anonymity told Excelsior that it is big scam by the accounts officials of the hospital. He said though the TDS was deducted by the accounts officials from their salary but they deposited only a part of that amount in IT department instead of depositing the entire amount.
He said it cannot be termed as just human error because human error can be in 10 or 20 cases but not in 117 cases, which is a large number. “Apparently there is something fishy and it needs to be probed by Crime Branch or Vigilance department”, he added.
When contacted Principal, GMCH, Dr Ghanshyam Dev said that the Accounts Section deals with the matter and it will take appropriate steps.
However, Chief Accounts Officer, GMCH Jammu, Dheeraj Jandial, when contacted, refuted all the charges. He said there is no scam. It is only human error in filling PAN in the Income Tax forms or mismatch of TDS amount due to which the situation has arisen, adding “We have rectified the errors on our part and forwarded the same to Government Treasury, which in turn will forward the same to Income Tax department.”
He further added that this whole rectification process takes at least six months.
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