A pair of fraudsters who bought and sold over 50 properties but failed to pay nearly £1 million in tax, have been jailed for more than eight years.

Madhu Bhajanehatti, 45, of London and Himat Chana, 59, of Ilford, Essex, sold dozens of properties over an eight-year period, and evaded £991,000 in Capital Gains Tax.

“Although the men disclosed some income on their Self-Assessment tax returns, they deliberately hid the sales of properties across London and Essex, a HM Revenue and Customs (HMRC) investigation revealed.

HMRC officers discovered the men had built up their property portfolios by using the proceeds of previous sales. The scam was uncovered by a property taskforce set up to tackle fraud in the industry.

Bhajanehatti evaded £650,000 in tax and Chana evaded £341,000. Bhajanehatti admitted the fraud during a hearing at Southwark Crown Court in June 2019. Chana was convicted after trial in August 2019, and on 17th January 2020, the men were sentenced at the same court to a combined total of eight years and six months in jail.

• Bhajanehatti was sentenced to 50 months in jail
• Chana was sentenced to 52 months in jail

Bhajanehatti was also ordered to pay back £190,086.42 in a confiscation order. He has less than three months to pay it back or he faces a further two years and six months in jail.

Confiscation proceedings for Chana are ongoing. If further assets are identified in the future for Bhajanehatti, they could also be confiscated.