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ED continues crackdown on Kashmiri separatists, likely to attach their assets

OpIndia Staff
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ED continues crackdown on Kashmiri separatists, likely to attach their assets

Continuing their crackdown after the Pulwama attack, the Enforcement Directorate is likely to attach the properties of the Kashmir separatists. The ED is currently probing charges of money laundering against the separatists based on an NIA FIR that alleged their activities were being funded by money from Pakistan-based terror groups.

According to reports, the ED is now in the process of identifying properties belonging to prominent separatist leaders. “We will soon file a prosecution complaint in the case. We have identified properties belonging to accused such as Zahoor Watali and some others associated with Syed Ali Shah Geelani and Mirwaiz Umar Farooq. Watali is the key conduit between separatists and outfits in Pakistan. These properties will be attached in due course,” an ED official said.

Earlier, the ED had recognised as many as 14 properties in Jammu and Kashmir belonging to Hafiz Muhammad Saeed, co-founder of Pakistan based Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist group and plans to seize the same.

Central agencies have identified several properties including malls, office complexes, residential spaces, bungalows, flats, partnership in companies, stone quarries and vast tracts of land, which were directly or indirectly belonging to the Hurriyat conference.

These were in the process of being verified, said sources. Most of these properties are located in Kashmir and few in Delhi in areas like Khirki Village and Vasant Kunj.

In the aftermath of the Pulwama attack, the NIA tightened its noose on the Kashmiri separatists, following Home Minister Rajnath Singh’s media address in which, making obvious reference to these separatists he asserted that there are some elements which are in connivance with terrorist organisations and are involved in terror conspiracies. He had furthered that these links would be probed.

Following this the NIA on February 26, the day the Indian Air force conducted ariel airstrikes bombing Jaish terror camps in Pakistan, conducted raids in seven locations including, the residences of Moderate Hurriyat Conference chairman Mirwaiz Umar Farooq and JKLF chairman Mohammad Yasin Malik, in Srinagar. Apart from these, houses of Muhammad Ashraf Sehrai, Zafar Akbar Bhat, Naseem Geelani, Masrat Alam, and Shabir Ahmed Shah were also raided.

These raids were in connection to the agency’s investigation in the alleged terror-funding case. A statement by NIA said that letterheads of different terrorist organisations, as well as documents relating to recommendations for a visa for admission in Pakistan educational institutions, were found during the raids.

In the massive crackdown, almost the entire leadership of Jamat-e-Islami and several other top separatist leaders had been detained. The security cover provided to separatists was withdrawn too.

Journalist asks Indian cricketers to learn from someone who put Allah’s law over country’s law

OpIndia Staff
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Journalist asks Indian cricketers to learn from someone who put Allah’s law over country’s law

“War is against the teachings of the Holy Quran. I’m not trying to dodge the draft. We are not supposed to take part in no wars unless declared by Allah or The Messenger. We don’t take part in Christian wars or wars of any unbelievers.”

This is what US boxer Muhammad Ali, born Cassius Clay before he converted to Islam, had to say when he refused to join the US army (register for the draft) for the Vietnam War. He was convicted for his stand, though the conviction was overturned a few years later thanks to the US constitution that grants one immense personal liberty.

However, what Ali professed was similar to what two-nation theory believes in – where Muslims are part of one common nation (the ummah) and the political boundaries of a country don’t define the concept of a nation. He put his faith above his country. In fact, at that time, Ali was a member of an orgnanisation called “Nation of Islam” that considered white people as evil and asked for separation of races.

Back then, though Ali became a villain for many, he could also get a lot of support as he presented his extremist religious beliefs nicely peppered with talks about injustice against black people in the US. The larger anti-war sentiments also made him a hero for many, who were willing to ignore his extremist religious views as it came wrapped in talks of justice, equality, peace, and brotherhood (though Muhammad Ali’s idea of brotherhood was entirely different then).

Incidentally, this same strategy is adopted by Jihad waging Kashmiris to get popular ‘liberal’ support in India – they camouflage their religious supremacist beliefs under the garb of human rights, injustice, and self-determination.

A terrorist openly says that he is fighting for Islam but our liberals just want to hear that there is injustice in Kashmir. Almost similar to what the left back in US heard only race and injustice against black people though Ali said that he was refusing the draft as “I either have to obey the laws of the land or the laws of Allah.”

If one has to fight against terrorism, one has to drop the political correctness and call a spade a spade. This camouflaging of religious bigotry and supremacism has to be called out.

But guess what our media does. It has problems with camouflage military caps that Indian cricket team wore on Friday in a match against Australia.

And most absurdly, an Assistant Editor in Times of India asked the Indian team to emulate Muhammad Ali who refused to back his own army. He called the Indian team “wannabe Army men” for this symbolic standing by our men in uniform who have been battling supremacist ideologies and sacrificing their lives to keep us safe.

What does this person want by asking the Indian cricketers to take inspiration from Muhammad Ali? That someone like Mohammed Shami should have refused to wear the cap citing his religious beliefs and should have claimed that Indian Army is fighting Muslims in Kashmir? In fact, almost certainly, if such an incident takes place, it will be a dream come true for our ‘liberal’ media.

Muhammad Ali was a great boxer, he was a sporting legend. But that doesn’t mean that everything he said or did becomes a gold standard. Years later after the draft incident, Ali accepted that some of his beliefs were too extreme and he left the Nation Of Islam, though he continued following Sunni Islam. There are also speculations that perhaps Ali feared being killed by the Nation Of Islam if he didn’t take such an extremist position.

However, for some in our media, his beliefs and deeds are worth emulating and our Indian cricketers did a great disservice to sports by standing by the army instead of refusing to support the army. This article in Times of India was not the only one, another one in Huffington Post’s also attacked the cricketers for sporting the camouflage military caps.

In recent times, there has been a spurt of articles that have tried to attack nationalism and downplay Islamic bigotry. Not just downplay, but a series of articles have been published to whitewash the bigotry; an alleged hate tracker declared that the terrorist who blew up people for ‘drinking cow urine’ was not communal.

Such narrative is being built not just in political or ideological fields, but as we can see, now it is being pushed in sports too. Entertainment was already captured with such narratives being championed by various placard friendly Bollywood celebrities.

Pakistan ha surely got its narrative right, and currently it’s leading by an innings and 44 runs.

Prashant Bhushan may have pushed his luck too far this time

Ashish Shukla
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Prashant Bhushan may have pushed his luck too far this time

Civil Riots…err…Rights Lawyer Prashant Bhushan gets away with murder. But this time he might have pushed his luck too far.

Even as Advocate General K.K. Venugopal was willing to withdraw his contempt and punishment petition against the mischief-making lawyer, the bench of Justices Arun Mishra and Navin Sinha said on Thursday: “You (Venugopal) may or may not withdraw the petition but you have raised a question and we will decide it.” This shows intent on the part of Supreme Court to come down hard on Bhushan.

Prashant Bhushan waded further into the muddle when he wanted Justice Arun Mishra to recuse himself from hearing the petition. Bhushan’s counsel Dushyant Dave initially insisted that there was apprehension in his client Bhushan’s mind that Justice Mishra might be “subconsciously biased” against him. Dave later offered an unconditional apology but Bhushan didn’t.

Venugopal’s contempt petition was on a Bhushan tweet, claiming that “he confirmed personally from Congress leader Mallikarjun Kharge” that the January 10 meeting of the panel, also comprising Prime Minister Narendra Modi and CJI’s nominee Justice AK Sikri, had neither discussed nor decided on the appointment of M. Nageswara Rao as interim CBI director. (Typically English mainstream media, barring Times of India, has hidden the offensive tweet-in-question from its readers—remember, these are the same newspapers who were drumming drones on our sight and mind, giving screaming headlines on CBI matter).

Meanwhile, SC would hear a contempt notice against Bhushan after Holi break (March 18-23). The court is annoyed that litigants and advocates air their views on media/social media instead of returning to court. “This is troubling all of us as an institution. This is happening in all cases of importance. Motives are attributed to judges,” observed Judge Arun Mishra. (Typically, N. Ram, Arun Shourie, Arundhati Roy, Aruna Roy and former chief information commissioner Wajahat Habibullah have filed intervention application against a possible gag order).

Almost a year ago, Bhushan had just about escaped any punishment through the lashing of a verbal kind had been delivered by Justice DY Chandrachud on a clutch of Public Interest Litigations (PILs) seeking probe into the death of a special CBI court judge BH Loya in 2014.

Dismissing the PILs, the SC had slammed Prashant Bhushan and his NGO, Centre for Public Interest Litigation (CPIL), “to mislead the court by manufacturing evidence.” Justice Chandrachud said in his judgment: “Prashant Bhushan adopted a dual mantle and went to the length of personally collecting evidence to bolster the case.”

Among many sharp observations, the apex court had said: “The petition is a veiled attempt to launch a frontal attack on the independence of the judiciary and to dilute the credibility of judicial institutions.” Such PILs, observed the court, “are found to promote a personal, business or political agenda.”

“This has the propensity of endangering the credibility of other institutions and undermining public faith in democracy and the rule of law,” added the court.

On Thursday, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta said: “the recent application was part of a pattern.” He recalled how the SC had severely criticized Mr Bhushan for asking justices DY Chandrachud and AM Khanwilkar to recuse from the Loya death case because they hailed from the Bombay High Court.  (same Bhushan has now done with Justice Arun Mishra).

What is this pattern and why it has put the institution of the judiciary in this country under risk?

Connecting the dots, it emerges the pattern is to first spread lies, then go the Court with a petition, discredit the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party, PM Narendra Modi in particular, and swirl a malicious campaign in the newspapers. That most such fake petitions fall flat on its face, doesn’t seem to embarrass or shame this lobby.

Offhand, I could recall two similar mischiefs. In 2017, Prashant Bhushan had pleaded in Supreme Court about an alleged pay-off by Birla-Sahara Group to Modi when the latter was Gujarat chief minister. The apex court dismissed Bhushan’s plea seeking a CBI probe into the matter.  Last year, Bhushan had tweeted: “Scamster (Mehul) Choksi became Antiguan citizen…after Modi met Antiguan president in April…” OpIndialater pointed out that Choksi had become an Antiguan citizen a good six month ago!!!

Then there was the medical college case in which the then Chief Justice of India, Dipak Mishra had observed:  “Mr Bhushan you are now liable for contempt. But you are not worthy to even of contempt.” (It’s another matter that the likes of Shourie, Yashwant Sinha and Arundhati Roy proudly put themselves in frame with Bhushan).

This is the same Prashant Bhushan who had filed a petition on Rafale last year and which Supreme Court had dismissed, saying “there is no reason to “doubt the decision-making process.” Bhushan has now raked up another plea on Rafale for Supreme Court to reconsider its judgment, the hearing of which began on Thursday.

(When Bhushan’s first petition on Rafale was thrown out by Supreme Court, the former had said: “new disclosures are expected soon.” This was on December 18, 2018. Just a few weeks later, The Hindu began its series of stories on Rafale. How did Bhushan know about the “new disclosures”? It raises the suspicion of a lobby working in unison.)

Now to the biggest irony which has concerned me for long. Prashant Bhushan who files petitions and PILs as Virat Kohli scores his centuries, a monotonous regularity, hasn’t touched Arvind Kejriwal all these years. Both run/have run NGOs, both worked together on Anna Hazare’s manch, both lent shoulders in forming Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), both were part of AAP’s Political Affairs Committee (PAC) before Kejriwal threw out Bhushan from the party with impunity. Why has Bhushan taken such a humiliation lying down? Does Kejriwal know something about Bhushan which the world doesn’t know?  My guess is as good as yours.

Karnataka: HD Revanna’s insensitive remark on Sumalatha, questions her entry into politics ‘within months of her husband’s death’

OpIndia Staff
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Karnataka: HD Revanna’s insensitive remark on Sumalatha, questions her entry into politics ‘within months of her husband’s death’

HD Revanna, the de-facto Chief Minister of the Karnataka, who is often known for insensitive remarks has again stirred up controversy after he made crass remarks against actor-turned-politician Sumalatha, wife of late actor Ambareesh.

Speaking to a local media, HD Revanna, the son of former Prime Minister HD Devegowda, made shocking remarks over the widowhood of Sumalatha. He questioned Sumalatha’s intent to contest polls just after her husband veteran actor MH Ambareesh’s death. Sumalatha, who is set to contest against Nikhil Kumaraswamy, the son of Chief Minister Kumaraswamy from Mandya- the fortress of JDS, has pushed the party on the back foot leading to HD Revanna making such derogatory statements.

“It’s not even a month since her husband died and she is already nursing political ambitions and wanting to contest elections. See what level they have gone to,” said HD Revanna, brother of Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy.

Ironically, HD Revanna’s such cheap comments came on International Women’s Day. He even said that Sumalatha was not grateful to what Chief Minister HD Kumaraswamy had done for actor-politician Ambareesh while referring to the arrangements made by the state government for his funeral. Ambareesh had passed away in November last year.

Meanwhile, Sumalatha reacting to the statements made by HD Revanna said, “Former prime minister Deve Gowda was a father figure to us. Our respect for him will continue. I am deeply hurt by the statement of HD Revanna.”

BJP state president BS Yeddyurappa condemned Revanna’s remarks and said such statements are uncalled for. It does not suit a minister, he told reporters. He said BJP had not taken any decision on the contest in Mandya. Sumalatha too had not approached the party for a ticket, he added.

Mandya Lok Sabha constituency is going to be one of the most crucial battles of 2019 Lok Sabha elections, as Sumalatha is challenging JDS in its own fortress. MH Ambareesh, who claims to be the son of the Mandya soil, had a good connect with Mandya from where he had won three times before losing to JDS. Sumalatha, who intends to contest from Mandya this year enjoys a very good wave among the voters, which has worried the JDS.

The JDS has now parachuted an inexperienced Nikhil Kumaraswamy, who had a devastating acting career, to contest from Mandya as part of a JDS-Congress coalition. The Congress party seems to have vacated the place for its junior party at the expense of Sumalatha. Sumalatha may now contest as an independent in Mandya, who enjoys much larger support than Nikhil Kumaraswamy furthering pushing JDS into desperation.

The Janata Dal (Secular), which is fighting for its relevance, is part of an ‘unholy alliance’ with the dominant Congress in Karnataka. The JDS-Congress coalition is intending to fight the Lok Sabha coalition together. However, party cadres of both the parties are averse to the idea of ceding seats to its coalition partner as Congress is the principal opponent of JDS in a large number of constituencies.

In the past, HD Revanna in a blatant show of insensitivity was caught throwing food packets at flood victims at Hassan, Karnataka. It was reported that some of the people declined to eat the biscuits which were thrown at them, while some others ate the biscuit packets as they were hungry and desperate.

Congress shenanigans: After Digvijaya Singh, Kapil Sibal, Kamal Nath, now Ashok Gehlot doubts authenticity of Balakot air strikes

OpIndia Staff
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Congress shenanigans: After Digvijaya Singh, Kapil Sibal, Kamal Nath, now Ashok Gehlot doubts authenticity of Balakot air strikes

Days after the Indian Air Force conducted air strikes on the terror camps in Balakot, senior Congress leaders have come out in what appears to be support of Pakistan by questioning the authenticity of the air strikes. After Digvijaya Singh and Kapil Sibal, latest to join the fray of Congress leaders asking for evidence for air strikes is the Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot.

Under the pretext of ‘people should know about the truth of the Balakot’ Rajasthan CM Ashok Gehlot on Friday attempted to corner the government regarding the ‘suspicion’ around the Balakot air strikes. Gehlot said, “Many international media agencies have been claiming that nothing has been found on the ground as claimed by India and creating confusion over the incident. The people of this country have a right to know and the government come out with a clarification to dispel the rumours and confusion around the strikes.”

Gehlot further blamed the government of intensifying the confusion by tossing out contrasting versions of the air strikes. Reiterating the opposition’s stand, Gehlot alleged that the government should come out clean by divulging the details of the air strikes operations. Accusing PM Modi and Amit Shah of diverting the discourse to win the elections, Rajasthan CM asserted that the PM has behaved in an irresponsible manner.

Earlier this week, senior Congress leader Kapil Sibal had questioned the strikes by referring to international media outlets, claiming that they are citing no evidence of the strikes. Another Congress leader Digvijay Singh had called the terror attack an ‘accident’. He said that reports in various foreign media regarding the “air strike” have created a doubt in our minds. Madhya Pradesh CM Kamalnath had also raised doubts about the authenticity of the attacks.

It is notable to mention that these senior Congress leaders doubting the authenticity of air strikes are basing their arguments on international media agencies while doubting the Indian Air Force’s claim of hitting the intended targets. Congress leaders have shown more faith in the international media agencies than on their own Air Force. In their endeavour to attack PM Modi and the BJP, Congress leaders are not only undermining the Armed Forces but are also appearing to support the Pakistani narrative.

PM Modi snatched money from badminton courts and gave it to Anil Ambani: Rahul Gandhi

OpIndia Staff
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PM Modi snatched money from badminton courts and gave it to Anil Ambani: Rahul Gandhi

Congress President Rahul Gandhi seems to have an extraordinary skill of connecting two unrelated issues to further his lies. Yesterday, while addressing women on International Women’s Day in Odisha, he attempted a similar stunt by bringing a reference of badminton courts to relate Rafale deal.

Congress President Rahul Gandhi’s attempt to accuse PM Narendra Modi of alleged irregularities in Rafale Deal by relating it to an unrelated issue of badminton left the women present at the event perplexed. Rahul Gandhi was interacting with a group of women on the occasion of Women’s Day at Koraput, Odisha.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=UcW1SXQw7Qo]

As Rahul Gandhi was addressing a group of women at Koraput, Odisha, one of the girls present at the event expressed her interests in badminton and asked Congress party’s vision for the development of the sports facilities in the state. The Gandhi scion inquiring about the state of infrastructure of badminton courts assured that Congress party will try to set up the necessary coaching system and infrastructure for the benefit of students in the state.

However, Rahul Gandhi did not stop there. Emphasising on the abundant resources present in the state of Odisha, Rahul Gandhi said that people of the state were not benefitting from these resources. Rahul Gandhi, with his ability to connect everything under the sun to Rafale deal and Anil Ambani, somehow did the same at Koraput too. He accused PM Modi of snatching badminton courts from the people to give the money to Anil Ambani.

“There is a HAL factory here. The biggest contract of the Indian Air Force worth thousands of crores should have been awarded to HAL. The engines of the Rafale aircraft was supposed to manufacture here. But, PM Modi snatched the deal from HAL and gifted it to his friend Anil Ambani…By giving the contract to Anil Ambani, PM Modi snatched away your jobs from Odisha. PM Modi snatched the money from your badminton courts and gave it to Anil Ambani,” said Congress President Rahul Gandhi.

Apart from his lies of PM Modi snatching away sports facilities from people in Odisha,  Congress president Rahul Gandhi added a new lie to his long list of Rafale lies. While talking to a group of women in Odisha on the occasion of Women’s Day, he said that the engine for the Rafale fighter jet was to be made in the engine plant of HAL in nearby Koraput. He had said that Koraput engine plant of HAL was going to manufacture engines for the Rafale jet, but Modi gave that business to Anil Ambani.

However, his lies were exposed yet again as MMRCA Medium Multi-Role Combat Aircraft (MMRCA), which was won by Dassault Rafale, was never concluded. Addition to this, Dassault was not willing to take responsibility for HAL made planes. So, in his hurry to accuse PM Modi, Rahul Gandhi deliberately lied to the people of Odisha by resorting to false facts to accuse PM Modi of corruption despite the fact he himself is out on bail for involving in a corruption scandal.

Nirav Modi runs away in London taxi after British journalist asks him about his fraud

OpIndia Staff
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Nirav Modi runs away in London taxi after British journalist asks him about his fraud

A journalist associated with the British publication The Telegraph reportedly tracked down the fugitive businessman, the Rs 13,000 crore PNB scam accused Nirav Modi in London.


In the video, the journalist can be seen asking Nirav Modi pointed questions on whether he has applied for political asylum in England and for how long does he intend to stay in England. However, Modi just smiled and said “no comment” in response. Nirav Modi is further questioned that the government officials have informed that he has applied for political asylum and that he is a subject of extradition application. To that, too, Nirav Modi replied with a firm “no comment”.

According to The Telegraph video, Nirav Modi was wearing a jacket made out of ostrich hide, which would cost at least 10,000 GBP. He can then be seen getting in a car, presumably a cab, and going off.

As per the report, Nirav Modi is currently living in an 8 million GBP luxury apartment and has also started a new diamond business. The Telegraph reports that Nirav Modi walks down his dog from his flat to his ‘new office’. It is also believed that he has acquired a national insurance number and owing to it, can now operate online bank accounts in the UK. He is also believed to be in touch with wealth management companies based in West London which advice rich foreigners.

Yesterday, Nirav Modi’s posh bungalow in Alibaug was dynamited since it violated construction norms.

The absconding diamond tycoon has been facing troubles as the ED and the CBI has been in relentless pursuit of Nirav Modi and his uncle Mehul Choksi after the 13,000 crore PNB scam was unearthed. Interpol has issued red corner notices for Nirav Modi, Mehul Choksi, Purvi Modi and Nishal Modi, Nirav’s sister and brother respectively.

In India too, the ED had in May moved the special court in Mumbai requesting permission for ‘immediate confiscation’ of about 7000 crores worth assets of designer diamond jeweler Nirav Modi under the recently annunciated ‘Fugitive Economic Offenders Ordinance’.

The department has since then attached several of Nirav Modi’s properties and bank accounts worth thousands of crores.

AAP MLA Naresh Balyan caught with over Rs 2 crore in unaccounted cash during Income Tax raid

OpIndia Staff
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AAP MLA Naresh Balyan caught with over Rs 2 crore in unaccounted cash during Income Tax raid

A team of Income Tax Department today conducted raids on the premises of AAP MLA from Uttam Nagar, Naresh Balyan, after he was found with unaccounted cash.


According to reports, the MLA was caught with an amount of around ₹2.25 crore. The raids were conducted in multiple locations linked to the AAP MLA in Dwarka area. Originally the Income Tax department had gone to raid a property dealer, where the Baliyan was found with unaccounted money. This had led to raids on locations belonging to Naresh Balyan by the department.


Last year I-T department had raided 16 locations linked to AAP leader and Delhi Transport Minister Kailash Gehlot on the charges of alleged tax evasion by two construction firms connected with the Minister. The IT Department had seized unaccounted jewels worth Rs 28 lakhs from a locker belonging to Gehlot and his wife. The worth of the total jewellery seized was Rs 2 crore along with Rs 37 lakhs of cash.

Aam Admi Party remains in trouble every now and then for matters related to funds. The party was slapped with a 30.67 crore IT notice in 2017 for not having disclosed income worth Rs 13 crores and not recording details of 462 donors who donated around Rs 6 crore to the party.

Some facts you need to know about the newly introduced charges for Aadhaar based e-KYC authentication

OpIndia Staff
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Some facts you need to know about the newly introduced charges for Aadhaar based e-KYC authentication

On 8th March, several people started spreading a piece of news on social media saying that the government has introduced charges for using the Aadhaar based e-KYC service offered by Unique Identification Authority of India (UIDAI). It was being informed that each e-KYC inquiry will be charged at ₹20, and each Yes/No authentication will be charged at ₹0.50. Many people said that these charges will be payable everywhere since Aadhaar authentication will be required at every monetary transaction in the near future.


Although the news about the charges for e-KYC verification is correct, it omits some important points about the rule which creates baseless panic among people.

Many people are assuming that these amounts will be charged from end users when they are required to use Aadhaar based e-KYC authentication to avail any service. But the fact is, these are the charges that UIDAI will collect from institutions that use the e-KYC service, and does not necessarily mean that end-users will have to bear that cost. Institutions may absorb the cost themselves or they may pass on the cost to consumers, that will depend on the decision of institutions and also on market forces.

The most important point is, several organisations are exempt from paying the charge. According to the Gazette notification issued by the government of India, Government offices and post offices are exempted from Aadhaar Authentication transaction charges. Scheduled Commercial Banks are also exempt from the charge, if they are providing Aadhaar enrolment and update facilities. But such banks will have to fulfil their enrolment and update targets to avail this exemption.

Gazette notification on e-KYC verification charges

The private companies that use e-KYC facility of UIDAI will have to pay the specified charges for using the facility. When such companies use manual varication process instead of using the e-KYC, then also they spend a significant amount on verifying consumer details. They do not charge any amount from the consumer for such verification, so it is wrong to assume that companies will start charging the e-KYC verification amount from consumers.

Moreover, even if some companies decide to charge the amount from consumers, people have the option to not use e-KYC. The government has clarified that Aadhaar can be used as KYC on a voluntary basis under the Telegraph Act and PMLA rules. Anyone not offering Aadhaar cannot be denied any service, be it opening of a bank account or obtaining a mobile phone SIM card. People can opt for using conventional KYC instead of Aadhaar based e-KYC, and such people can’t be denied service for the same.

MSME sector created around 1.5 crore jobs each year in last 4 years, CII finds in its latest survey

OpIndia Staff
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MSME sector created around 1.5 crore jobs each year in last 4 years, CII finds in its latest survey

Amid all the claims of jobless growth during the term of Modi government, a survey conducted by Confederation of Indian Industry (CII) has found an increase of 13.9% in net job creations in the MSME sector over the last four years. In the largest ever survey specific to Micro, Small & Medium Enterprises, over one lakh firms of various sizes were included across various sectors and geographies.

CII is India’s premier business organisation, it is a non-government, not-for-profit, industry-led and industry-managed body. It has over 9,000 members, and indirect membership of over 3,00,000 enterprises through around 265 national and regional sectoral industry bodies.

“The survey establishes a growth of 3.3 per cent (compounded growth rate) per annum. When mapped to the macro level data sourced from Labour Bureau, this works out to an estimated additional job creation to the tune of 13.5 to 14.9 million per annum”, said Mr Rakesh Bharti Mittal, President of CII. The total strength of labour forces is estimated at about 45 crore in the year 2017-18 using data from labour bureau.

According to the survey, Hospitality & Tourism was the top job generating sector, followed by Textiles & Apparel, Metal Products, Machinery Parts and Transport & Logistic. “The survey also reveals that the Micro enterprises were the largest job creators in the past four years and will continue to be so in the next three years” CII Director General Mr Chandrajit Banerjee said.

The survey indicates the higher growth on employment generation will continue for next two-three years. It is expected that government initiatives like the 2 per cent interest rate subvention given to all MSMEs and Trade Receivable e-Discounting System (TReDS) implemented recently would drive future growth leading to more employment. “However, the CII survey highlights the need for greater hand-holding of the MSMEs who are still to take full advantage of these Government initiatives,” said Mr Banerjee.

The survey by CII shows that a majority of enterprises were able to fill vacancies under a month, indicating higher availability of skilled manpower. “The survey has indeed thrown up the most promising outcomes. There is a very healthy growth in employment among the MSME segment of industry and with the kind of disruptions and innovations that are likely to sweep through industry in terms of new technologies and practices, our skills development front is also undergoing rapid changes,” said the CII President.

CII conducted the survey in about n350 industrial locations in 28 states in India, and covered 105,347 MSMEs. The survey included queries on jobs creation, ease of filling up vacancies, impact of Government initiatives on jobs creation by the MSMEs.

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