London Distillers Kenya Limited Director Mohan Galot was arraigned at Milimani Law Courts o Wednesday over Sh2.1 billion tax evasion.

Galot was arraigned before Magistrate Martha Mutuku, facing a total of 18 counts among them failure to pay taxes contrary to Section 95 as read with section 104(1) of the Tax Procedures Act, 2015.

He pleaded not guilty to all the counts before he was granted a cash bail of 1 million shillings. The case will be mentioned on August 9.

In the first count, Galot together with the company London Distillers Kenya Limited are alleged that between January 2016 and 31st December 2016 unlawfully omitted the excise Duty returns for the year 2016 production volumes totalling to 164, 539 litres of ready to drinks and 2,902,662 of spirit which ought to have been declared to the Kenya Revenue Authority (KRA) as required by the Excise Duty Act 23 of 2015 laws of Kenya.

The charge sheet outlines the second charge of omitting from tax returns production volumes and sales amounts contrary to section 97 (a) as read with section 104 (3) of the Tax Procedures Act, 2015.

An investigation into London Distillers (K) Limited found that the firm and its director devised a scheme to evade taxes, including Excise duty on locally manufactured spirits, VAT and Corporation taxes.

Investigations revealed that the taxpayer engaged in a scheme of gross underreporting of production and sales volumes and purchase of packaging materials through associated firms.