Celebrity chef Tommy Miah faces £229,000 tax bill

Bangladeshi-born British celebrity chef Tommy Miah also known as ‘Curry King’, the owner of the award-winning The Raj Restaurant, and his wife Anwara have been barred from the position of company director for seven years after racking up a £229,000 tax debt, reports the Edinburgh Evening News.

The ‘Curry King’ reportedly failed to keep accounts for The Raj restaurant in Edinburgh.

Miah, 59, faces the possibility that he will be stripped of his MBE (Member of the Order of the British Empire), the threat of criminal proceedings, a fine and up to three months of jail time, the Evening News reports.

Miah was awarded the prestigious award at the Queen’s Birthday Honours List last year for services to charity and the hospitality industry.

“Directors have a duty to ensure that their companies maintain proper accounting records, and, following insolvency, deliver them to the office-holder in the interests of fairness and transparency,” said Insolvency Service Head of Company Investigation Robert Clarke.

“Without a full account of transactions it is impossible to determine whether a director has discharged his duties properly, or is using a lack of documentation as a cloak for impropriety.”

Miah and his wife were both on the board of Murrayfield Developments Limited and were joint directors of the organisation from 2012 until it ceased trading in November 2015 and plunged into liquidation after it was found owing creditors over £260,000.

The Insolvency Service investigated the incident, leading to a civil trial.

The lack of documentation meant there was no trail for £1 million paid from the company’s bank accounts.

The trial found the Miahs caused Murrayfield Developments Limited to trade to the UK tax collection agency while insolvent from Jan 1, 2014 to the date of liquidation, leading to a tax debt of at least £228,920.

Tommy Miah is known for founding the International Indian Chef of the Year Competition to promote quality and innovation in Indian cooking.

He has also raised funds for an orphanage in Bangladesh’s Sreepur and Cancer Research UK.