CEB employees who have received payments from the Inland Revenue Department on the false pretext of being overtaxed are alleged to have submitted fraudulently obtained documents to the IR, well informed sources said.

Twenty one senior employees found guilty by the Auditor General had been issued with T 10 forms, the sources said, asserting that this particular document could be issued only to an employee who had paid PAYE tax. In this case, the CEB employees didn’t have a right to seek reimbursement as their PAYE tax had been paid by the CEB, the sources said. It would be interesting to know the identity of the official who issued T 10 forms, the sources said.

‘The Island’ learns that the Power Ministry hasn’t taken any tangible action although the Auditor General had identified the employees involved in the racket.

Controversy surrounds the inordinate delay in taking disciplinary action against employees who had received payments to the tune of Rs 1.3 million. The sources speculated that this fraudulent practice wouldn’t have been an isolated case. The possibility of it being continued couldn’t be ruled out, the sources said.

A senior CEB official said that the CEB wasn’t the only government institute which had paid PAYE tax of their employees. The government was fully aware of this, he said, asserting that politicians would continue to turn a blind eye to this issue.

Although this has been brought to the notice of the Power and Energy Ministry and the CEB, action hasn’t been taken against the workers. The ministry also ignored the damning COPE (Committee on public enterprises) assertion that a loan obtained from the JBIC (Japanese Bank for International Corporation) was spent on super luxury vehicles for top officials.

Officials and trade union sources said that the payment of PAYE tax on behalf of workers was illegal.