India country of Hindus first, others later: Sena

Mumbai, Mar 8: A day after the Enforcement Directorate registered a money laundering case against Yes Bank founder Rana Kapoor and raided his premises, he was taken to the agency's office in Mumbai on Saturday for further questioning.

Kapoor, who was grilled by central agency's officials on Friday night at his Samudra Mahal residence in Mumbai, was shifted to the ED office in the metropolis around 12.30 pm.

ED officials said Kapoor was questioned throughout the night, with some rest time.

A senior ED official connected with the probe told IANS: "Kapoor will be questioned about Yes Bank loans to Dewan Housing Finance Limited (DHFL)."

The official said that during searches a lot of incriminating documents were found and the agency wanted to grill him on his links with DHFL promoters and other companies.

Kapoor's alleged role in the disbursal of loan to a corporate entity and kickbacks reportedly received in his wife's bank account are also under probe.

The ED had filed the money laundering case against Kapoor and raided his residence, apart from issuing a look-out circular so that he does not flee the country.

The ED registered a money laundering case against Kapoor as a continuation of its probe against the DHFL wherein it was allegedly found that Rs 12,500 crore was diverted to 80 shell companies using one lakh fake borrowers. The transactions with these shell companies date back to 2015.

An ED official in New Delhi told IANS that the DHFL probe revealed that funds diverted by the DHFL originated from Yes Bank.

He said that the searches at Kapoor's residence on Friday night were meant to find out any irregularity in grant of loans to the DHFL by the Yes Bank.

The ED has accused Kapil and Dheeraj Wadhawan of DHFL of purchasing shares in five firms -- Faith Realtors, Marvel Township, Abe Realty, Poseidon Realty, and Random Realtors -- after which they were amalgamated with Sunblink.

The outstanding loans of these five firms, totalling around Rs 2,186 crore till July 2019, were allegedly appropriated onto the books of Sunblink to cover up the diversion of loans acquired from DHFL.

The ED's action comes after the RBI superseded Yes Bank Board for 30 days and appointed an administrator, putting a cap of Rs 50,000 on withdrawals by account holders for a month.

The RBI said that the bank's board was superseded "owing to serious deterioration in the financial position of the bank".

Former SBI CFO Prashant Kumar was appointed as administrator of Yes Bank, which has over 1,000 branches and 1,800-plus ATMs across the country.

On Thursday, Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said that the bank was on watch since 2017 and developments relating to it were monitored on a day-to-day basis.

New Delhi, Apr 23: The nationwide lockdown in India which started about a month ago has impacted nearly 40 million internal migrants, the World Bank has said.

The lockdown in India has impacted the livelihoods of a large proportion of the country's nearly 40 million internal migrants. Around 50,000 60,000 moved from urban centers to rural areas of origin in the span of a few days, the bank said in a report released on Wednesday.

According to the report -- 'COVID-19 Crisis Through a Migration Lens' -- the magnitude of internal migration is about two-and-a-half times that of international migration.

Lockdowns, loss of employment, and social distancing prompted a chaotic and painful process of mass return for internal migrants in India and many countries in Latin America, it said.

Thus, the COVID-19 containment measures might have contributed to spreading the epidemic, the report said.

Governments need to address the challenges facing internal migrants by including them in health services and cash transfer and other social programmes, and protecting them from discrimination, it said.

World Bank said that coronavirus crisis has affected both international and internal migration in the South Asia region.

As the early phases of the crisis unfolded, many international migrants, especially from the Gulf countries, returned to countries such as India, Pakistan, and Bangladesh until travel restrictions halted these flows.

Some migrants had to be evacuated by governments, such as those of China and Iran, it said.

Before the coronavirus crisis, migrant outflows from the region were robust, the report said.

The number of recorded, primarily low-skilled emigrants from India and Pakistan rose in 2019 relative to the prior year but is expected to decline in 2020 due to the pandemic and oil price declines impacting the Gulf countries.

In India, the number of low-skilled emigrants seeking mandatory clearance for emigration rose slightly by eight percent to 368,048 in 2019.

In Pakistan, the number of emigrants jumped 63 per cent to 6,25,203 in 2019, largely due to a doubling of emigration to Saudi Arabia, it said.

According to the bank, migration flows are likely to fall, but the stock of international migrants may not decrease immediately, since migrants cannot return to their countries due to travel bans and disruption to transportation services.

In 2019, there were around 272 million international migrants.

The rate of voluntary return migration is likely to fall, except in the case of a few cross-border migration corridors in the South (such as Venezuela-Colombia, Nepal-India, Zimbabwe South Africa, Myanmar-Thailand), it said.

Migrant workers tend to be vulnerable to the loss of employment and wages during an economic crisis in their host country, more so than native-born workers.

Lockdowns in labour camps and dormitories can also increase the risk of contagion among migrant workers.

Many migrants have been stranded due to the suspension of transport services. Some host countries have granted visa extensions and temporary amnesty to migrant workers, and some have suspended the involuntary return of migrants, it said.

Observing that government policy responses to the COVID-19 crisis have largely excluded migrants and their families back home, the World Bank said there is a strong case for including migrants in the near-term health strategies of all countries, given the externalities associated with the health status of an entire population in the face of a highly contagious pandemic.

The Bank said governments would do well to consider short, medium and long-term interventions to support stranded migrants, remittance infrastructure, loss of subsistence income for families back home, and access to health, housing, education, and jobs for migrant workers in host/transit countries and their families back home.

The pandemic has also highlighted the global shortage of health professionals and an urgent need for global cooperation and long-term investments in medical training, it said.

Jan 31: President Ram Nath Kovind on Friday hailed the contentious Citizenship Amendment Act as "historic" in his address to joint sitting of both houses of Parliament, prompting protests by some opposition members.

He also said that debate and discussion on any issue strengthens democracy while violence during protests weaken it.

"The Citizenship Amendment Act is a historic law. It has fulfilled wishes of our founding fathers including Mahatma Gandhi," he said.

"Debate and discussions strengthen democracy, but violence during protests weaken democracy," he said without directly referring to the anti-CAA protests in the country some of which have witnessed violence.

In a reference to abrogation of Article 370, Kovind said there is happiness among people of India that people in Jammu and Kashmir and Ladakh have got rights on par with the rest of the country.

The president said Parliament has created record in the first seven months of the new government headed by Narendra Modi by enacting several landmark legislations.

"My government is taking strong steps for making this decade as India's decade and this century as India's century," he said.