Hyderabad: The CBI on Saturday arrested Commissioner of Income Tax (Exemption), Hyderabad, Jeevan Lal Lavidiya, for allegedly accepting a bribe of Rs 70 lakh to settle an appeal in favour of Shapoorji Pallonji Group, officials said here.

Lavidiya, a 2004-batch Indian Revenue Service (IRS) officer, was arrested along with Viral Kantilal Mehta, Deputy General Manager (Taxation) of Shapoorji Pallonji Group; Sairam Palisetty; Natta Veera Naga Sri Ram Gopal; and Sajida Majhar Hussain Shah.

With these arrests, a big corporate fraud allegedly committed by Shapoorji Pallonji group has come to the fore. The company, in collusion with the Income Tax official, allegedly attempted to evade crores of rupees of income tax and cause a big revenue loss to the government.

The IRS official, who was also holding additional charge as Commissioner of Income Tax (Appeals Unit-8 and Unit-7) under the Office of the Chief Principal Commissioner of Income Tax, reportedly tampered with some records, thereby facilitating tax evasion for years. There was no immediate response from Shapoorji Pallonji Group on the arrests.

According to CBI officials, Sajida Majhar Hussain Shah was allegedly delivering the bribe to Lavidiya. The agency registered an FIR against Lavidiya and 14 others and entities on allegations that the officer "in connivance with middlemen was indulging in corrupt and illegal activities of obtaining undue gratification for extending illegal favours in deciding appeals in favour of the private parties whose appeals were pending with him for decision."

A trap was laid and one of the accused was caught while accepting a bribe of Rs 70 lakh on behalf of the Commissioner in Mumbai. Subsequently, Lavidiya and his associates were arrested from Hyderabad, a CBI spokesperson said.

The agency conducted searches at 18 locations, including in Mumbai, Hyderabad, Khammam, Visakhapatnam and New Delhi, leading to the recovery of approximately Rs 69 lakh in cash, in addition to the bribe amount, a spokesperson said. All the accused were produced before the special CBI courts in Mumbai, Andhra Pradesh and Telangana.

Hailing from Khammam district, Lavidia began his career as software engineer in ECIL, Hyderabad and joined civil services in the early 2000. He held various positions in IT departments such as assistant commissioner and deputy commissioner (Investigation), Joint Commissioner for International Taxation and Pricing (Mumbai) and Additional Commissioner of Intelligence and Criminal Investigation (AP & Telangana) before assuming charge as Commissioner of Income Tax (Exemption) in Hyderabad.