ED seizes ₹20.87 crore assets of Dabur’s Pradip Burman in probe of HSBC black money list

The ED on Tuesday said it has seized assets worth ₹20.87 crore of Dabur group Director Pradip Burman in connection with its FEMA probe in the HSBC bank black money list unearthed few years ago.

The Enforcement Directorate (ED) initiated the action under the provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) and the seized assets include 50,000 tax -free government bonds of HUDCO and IRFC.

The agency took over the case on the basis of a charge sheet filed by the Income Tax Department (ITD) against Burman as part of its probe in the leaked HSBC list of Indians.

The trial in this ITD case is still to commence.

The agency said the assets were seized after it was found that Burman deposited $32.12 lakh in his account with HSBC bank in Zurich in Switzerland and that he “did not” show this amount in his IT Returns filed during 2007-08 despite declaring it to the taxman that this was his earning.

“The investigation revealed that Burman has deposited $32.12 lakh with HSBC, Zurich and was holding the same in contravention of section 4 of the FEMA and failed to repatriate the entire amount to India till date,” the ED said.

Burman is a Director in Ms Dabur India Limited, Ms Sanat Product Ltd and Ayurved, Ms Ratna Commercial Enterprises (P) Ltd and is also a trustee in the Burman family trust called the Dr S K Burman Charitable Trust.

This case is one among the list of 628 Indians, who figured in a list of account holders in HSBC Bank’s Geneva branch, that India had obtained from the French government in 2007.