Was Amitabh summoned by the IT Dept?

Was Amitabh Bachchan summoned by the Income Tax Dept?
18th Mar 2006 09.23 IST
By Agencies

The Income Tax department on Friday remained tight-lipped about the visit of mega superstar Amitabh Bachchan to IT's central circle office at Aaykar Bhavan in Mumbai in connection with his tax assessment matter.

Bachchan went to Income Tax office with his chartered accountant I C Jain on Thursday regarding a long-pending tax assessment matter, sources said but refused to divulge details.

Asked why Bachchan had come to income tax office, the Chief Commissioner of IT, Central Circle, P N Dubey, said "no comments....I do not want to say anything."

Sources said high profile assessee's normally do not go personally unless they are summoned. However, it was not known whether Amitabh was summoned.

Interestingly, the visit of the mega star collided with the "Walk out" staged by most of the department employees against the Centre's move to set up large taxpayer units.

Income tax department is claiming tax demands from Bachchan in few cases. Some of them pertain to his earnings from abroad while others deal with his earnings from a game show, sources said adding it was not known in which case he had approached the IT department.

This is for the second time Bachchan has visited IT office, the first, was seven months ago, the sources said.

Bachchan's tax responsibility has been a issue of debate since a long time. The actor had paid an amount of Rs five crore at one go, when he was slapped with a tax payment notice from the department during his hospitalisation recently following an intestinal problem.

The Samajwadi Party had taken up this issue in Parliament and alleged that Bachchan was targeted by the Government.