FM: Govt is probing asset details
Details of assets and payments received by Indian citizens in several countries have “started flowing in” and are being investigated, finance minister Pranab Mukherjee disclosed on Saturday.
Information about wealth stashed away in Swiss banks by Indians is expected by the government before the end of the year, he indicated after pointing out that India had signed a Double Taxation Avoidance Treaty with Switzerland.
The treaty is likely to be ratified by the Swiss by September and information about tax avoidance should be available thereafter.
Information regarding assets and payments received by Indian citizens was now under different stages of processing, he said.
Rejecting the Opposition charge that the government was not serious about dealing with black money, the minister said that while previous governments which included the BJP, CPI and the other Opposition parties had done nothing in this regard, the UPA had launched a five-pronged strategy in this regard.
Besides creating an appropriate legislative framework, the government had started renegotiations with 75 countries to get more information.
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Centre seeks report on missing kids
Age Correspondent
New Delhi
July 30: The Centre has asked all state governments to send a monthly report to the CBI on missing children and the suspected traffickers and handover cases with inter-state ramifications and cross-border linkages to the central agency.
Concerned about the “organised crime” aspect in human trafficking and missing children across the country, the home ministry has asked the CBI to investigate such cases. “The CBI may use the data already available with them to see and investigate the organised crime perspective,” the home ministry has said. The MHA is also examining the CBI’s proposal to set up anti-human trafficing units within the agency. The home ministry noted that states like Meghalaya, Jharkhand, Arunachal Pradesh, Haryana, Himachal Pradesh, Uttar Pradesh, Gujarat and Nagaland are lagging in efforts to crack down on traffickers and undertaking rescue operations. Many states have not completed the establishment of anti-human trafficking units, it noted. Last week, the home ministry held a meeting with the state nodal officers on trafficking in human beings, representatives of the ministry of labour and the CBI, where it was decided that a database on trafficking gangs should be developed by states and shared with the CBI.
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