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March 14, 2018, Firstpost The National Investigation Agency (NIA) probe in the Kashmir unrest has revealed that the money raised through cross-LoC trade between India and Pakistan was used to fan the support for different militant outfits including the Islamic State in Jammu and Kashmir. The NIA which has tightened the noose around the separatist leaders has also named some more Hurriyat leaders for spreading the unrest in Kashmir. It has named the Jammu and Kashmir Liberation Front (JKLF) vice chairman, Bashir Ahmad Bhat and president of Salamabad Traders Union, Hilal Turki, for spreading the unrest. Turki, however, said that he can’t talk as he was busy attending a mourning ritual. NIA spokesman, Alok Mittal, said that the investigating agency was probing the Kashmir unrest and "we are in the process of collecting the evidence to file the charges against people in the Court". The NIA report, which is based on the disclosure statement of some protected witnesse...

The Fugitive Economic Offenders Bill, 2018, which was introduced in the Lok Sabha this week, aims to provide for measures to deter fugitive economic offenders from evading the process of law in India. It is a deterrent for those offenders who continue to stay outside the jurisdiction of Indian courts. The larger objective of the proposed legislation is to “preserve the sanctity of the rule of law”. In its statement of objectives and reasons, the government refers to the “several instances of economic offenders fleeing the jurisdiction of Indian courts anticipating the commencement of criminal proceedings or sometimes during the pendency of such proceedings”. Fugitive businesspersons Vijay Mallya and Nirav Modi have resisted the jurisdiction of Indian courts. The absence of such offenders from Indian courts has several deleterious consequences, such as obstructing investigation in criminal cases and wasting the precious time of courts. In effect, it undermines the rule of law ...

 March 15, 2018 Bankers on Thursday decided to put in place more robust and secure risk management mechanism within six months to check fraudulent activity by unscrupulous elements in the aftermath of the country's largest bank fraud of Rs 130 billion allegedly perpetuated by  Nirav Modi. All public sector  banks  have verified LoUs issued by them, and there are no other unauthorised authority letters except for those issued by PNB, State Bank of India Deputy MD M S Sastry said. It is important to note that the major incident that took place recently in one of the branches of a public sector  banks  is one of its kind in about 5,000 branches, dealing in foreign exchange in the entire banking system in India, he said. Addressing media after three-day deliberation, he said,  banks  will be putting up their action plan to respective boards and in three to six months action plan would be implemented by all the  banks. Action pla...

March 15, 2018  A faulty tax assessment system is letting large conglomerates get away with paying lower taxes, according to a confidential document written by the Indian Audit and Accounts Department. Using billionaire Mukesh Ambani's Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL) as a test case, the Director General of Audit (Central) in Mumbai at the Indian Audit and Accounts Department conducted an integrated audit of India’s most valued company. The intent was to “examine the impact of scrutiny assessment and extent of co-ordination/cross-linking amongst different assessment charges of the Income Tax Department and ascertain whether there was exchange of relevant information relating to group companies for accomplishing quality assessment,” according to the document seen by  BusinessLine . “We selected RIL as it is one of the biggest corporate entities in the country and engaged in diversified business activities,” wrote Guljari Lal, Director General of Audit (Central). The in...

The Cabinet has approved continuation of the urea subsidy till 2020 at an estimated cost of Rs 1,64,935 crore. The government also approved implementation of direct benefit transfer (DBT) for disbursement of fertiliser subsidy. Retail price of urea has not been changed from Rs 5,360/tonne or Rs 268/50-kg bag (excluding central/state tax and charges towards neem coating) since 2012. Prices vary from state to state and on an average farmers get urea at about Rs 300/bag. The Centre subsidises the difference between the cost of delivered fertilisers at retail store (both cost of production and freight) and the MRP paid by farmers. The subsidy is paid to fertiliser manufacturer/ importer by the government. The continuation of the urea subsidy scheme will ensure that adequate quantity of the fertiliser is made available to farmers at statutory controlled price, the government said in a statement. The implementation of DBT in the fertiliser sector will reduce diversion and plug le...

April 19, 2018 The Bharat Bandh on April 2 called by  Dalit  groups was a result of the successful use of  artificial intelligence  (AI), the  geographic information system  (GIS) and big data, according to a core group of US-based  Dalit  activists. The protest, which surprised many because of its sudden eruption, was organised against the alleged dilution of the SC/ST (Prevention of Atrocities) Act. New Jersey-based Deelip Mhaske, who heads a  secretive  network of some 100 overseas  Dalit  activists based in the US, the UK,  Australia  and the  Middle East  said the protest shows that  Dalits  no longer need to be affiliated to any political establishment. "A new era for  Dalit  politics has begun by adopting artificial intelligence, the  GIS  and social media," Mhaske told  PTI  in an interview as he gave an insight "A new era for  Dalit  poli...

April 19, 2018 Thirty years ago, income distribution in India was regarded as relatively equal, at least in international comparison. Meanwhile, Brazil was breaking world records for inequality. Today, inequality in India is high and increasing, while in Brazil it has declined substantially since the 1990s. As a result, on many measures India is now more unequal than Brazil. At the global level, inequality has become a central concern, and not just among politicians and intellectuals of the left – it is on the agenda of major international institutions such as the IMF and the World Bank, and is a key subject of debate in the Davos meetings of the World Economic Forum. The reasons are not hard to see. High inequality can be a threat to both political stability and economic growth; and it raises fundamental ethical questions about the fairness of both global and national economies. What has been going on in India and Brazil? Brazil went through a period of rapid growth before 1...

April 19,2018 The Government may have attributed the ongoing currency shortage on “hoarding”, a “shortage mentality” and a surprising surge in demand but the build-up to the current situation has triggers that go as far back as early last year. Consider the following: * Since April 1, 2017, nearly 48 per cent of the total currency notes supplied are lower denomination notes of Rs 200 and below, according to RBI data until December 31, 2017. During this time, RBI stopped printing Rs 2,000 notes, based on the calculation that about 3.7 billion Rs 2000 notes amounting to Rs 7.4 trillion had already been printed, the implicit view being that this has more than compensated for the 6.3 billion Rs 1,000 notes that were withdrawn post demonetisation. * While there was a proposal to reintroduce the Rs 1000 note, this plan seems to have been jettisoned along the way. Sources said the gap between the Rs 2,000 notes and the next highest denomination, the Rs 500 currency notes, led to i...