NEW DELHI: The elite criminal investigation wing of the Income Tax department, which conducted a number of high-profile actions including raids on liquor baron Ponty Chadha, has been disallowed to carry out any search or seizure operations by the finance ministry henceforth.
The just over-an-year old wing called the Directorate of Criminal Investigation, created in May 2011 to combat the menace of blackmoney and develop cases of illegal funds of "criminal nature", will now only work to develop a robust database of financial information and aid the regular investigation wings of the I-T to undertake "specific and result-oriented" search and survey operations.
"The DCI, henceforth, will not undertake operations which they did under section 132 of the I-T Act (search and seizure). It will now be an intelligence gathering, analysis and dissemination wing of the I-T department," top sources said. The wing, however, can carry out some on-spot verification if the need arises, they said.
Sources said the CBDT has recently ordered the wing, based in New Delhi, to study mounds of electronic data generated by economic intelligence agencies like the Financial Intelligence Unit, Central Economic Intelligence Bureau and those sent by IB and ED, and supply it to regular probe units of the I-T spread across India who will take action like raids and seizure of cash and other valuables.
Source : timesofindia.indiatimes.com