Bengaluru, Nov 4 (IANS): The Income Tax Department carried out search and seizure operations on one of the leading business groups of Karnataka, engaged in the civil construction of roads and irrigation projects, at various premises located in north Karnataka, a statement said on Wednesday.

The search operation, on October 28, has revealed that this group has been suppressing its profits by booking bogus expenses in purchase of materials, labour expenses and payment to sub-contractors, it said.

Various incriminating documents including digital evidences indicating non-genuine claim of such expenses have been found and seized, it said.

The I-T Department said that analysis of the same shows that unaccounted cash has been received by the key group persosn from such vendors/suppliers of materials. It was also found that their own relatives/friends/employees were used as conduits in the name of sub-contractors who neither executed any work nor did they have the capability/capacity to execute the work. The assessee group has been generating unaccounted cash from these transactions.

The search action has led to detection of unaccounted income of more than Rs 70 crore which has been admitted as undisclosed income by the assessee group.

Further investigations are in progress.