Hyderabad: The United States has expanded its action against tax evaders to countries like India, Israel and Liechtenstein, a top US official told lawmakers on Wednesday. The tax probe had untill now had focused only on Switzerland.
According to a PTI report, US deputy attorney-general James M Cole, told a Congressional committee on Wednesday: “While the (justice) department’s initial efforts and this hearing have focused on Switzerland, we have expanded our investigations to go after tax cheats and the banks assisting them in India, Israel, Liechtenstein, Luxembourg, and several Caribbean countries.”
Quoting a US Senate report, The Wall Street Journal claims the US loses about $100 billion annually due to offshore tax evasion. The decision to bring investments in India under the tax probe may have been prompted by the presence of a large number of Indian origin Americans. Persons of Indian origin or non-resident Indians are the biggest investors in India and are one of the mainstays of India’s foreign fund inflow.
Hinting at the US justice department’s focus on wealthy Indian Americans, American newspaper USA Today reported that HSBC had alerted Indian American clients of a US probe into offshore tax evasion in the United Kingdom, another overseas hub for Indian Americans. The US newspaper had claimed that Sanjay Nair, HSBC’s former head of services for Indians living outside their homeland, had written to the clients confirming that the London-based banking giant had received an IRS summons seeking the names of Americans who hold accounts at the bank.
He had reportedly urged Indian-American clients to consult with a US tax advisor “if you have any concerns about your US tax reporting relating to your HSBC India account(s).” Mr Martin Press, a Fort Lauderdale tax law expert, claimed he and his firm had been consulted by several HSBC Indian-American clients on the tax probe.
