Mumbai: The Income Tax Appellate Tribunal (ITAT) has dismissed an appeal that challenged attachment of Rs 52 crore deposit in a credit society which were allegedly amounts paid for transfers and postings in the state public works department (PWD). Ashok Chavanwas PWD minister in the MVA govt when the alleged transaction took place, though the tribunal order has not found anything linking him.Chavan was a Congress leader and in 2024, he joined BJP and is now an MP.Earlier, the adjudicating authority, while confirming the attachment, had ‘not identified Ashok Chavan as the beneficial owner,’ and ‘SAMRAT,’ who allegedly accumulated most of the Rs 450 crore from PWD transfers along with other sources, remained unidentified.The tribunal’s order mentioned Prashant Nilawar and Jayant Hiralal Shah as intermediaries in the PWD ministry, who were primarily involved in real estate and construction. The I-T department’s 2021 investigation revealed their involvement in corrupt PWD practices.Investigations showed substantial cash deposits in 900 new non-PAN accounts at the Buldana Urban Co-operative Credit Society. These deposits were subsequently converted into fixed deposits and later withdrawn with ‘SAMRAT’ identified as the beneficial owner. On Sept 23, 2021, I-T officials had searched Prashant Nilawar and Jayant Hiralal Shah. The tribunal said, “The document/summary sheet was found stored in the photo gallery of iPhone found in the custody of CA Nilesh Toshniwal which gave express details of overall cash of Rs 450.3 crores generated from HAM Works and transfer and posting in PWD and other work and outgoing cash to “JS” and to “SAMRAT”.”The I-T evidence failed to establish that the beneficial owner made the deposits or prove Ashok Chavan’s involvement in the appellants’ bank account deposits.In the appeal, it was said, “Merely non-filing of the income-tax returns by some depositors would not make out a case ofbenami transactionbecause returns are not mandatory for individuals whose income was below the taxable limit. In fact, the appellants were coming from rural and some from urban area (sic) and to see that their savings are mobilized, they opened the bank accounts and converted the bank accounts into FD after its deposit thus the Adjudicating Authority could not have drawn inference that the deposits were not genuine rural investment.” The counsel argued rapid deposits could occur during Deposit Melas, suggesting that quick deposits shouldn’t automatically indicate benami transactions.