Where politicians invest: Mutual funds, RIL and even Kingfisher Airlines

Agencies
April 29, 2019

New Delhi, Apr 29: Fixed deposits and tax-free bonds seem to be among the most favoured financial investments for the political leaders fighting the Lok Sabha polls, while mutual funds and stocks also adorn the portfolios of many and some even have got shares of long-defunct firms like Kingfisher Airlines.

Shares of Mukesh Ambani-led Reliance Industries Ltd (RIL), the country’s most valued company with a market capitalistion of over Rs 8.82 trillion, can be found in the portfolios of several leaders, while stocks and mutual fund units of the firms from younger brother Anil Ambani-led Reliance Group are also a common sight, as per disclosures made in election affidavits of the contestants.

However, some top leaders including Prime Minister Narendra Modi have no stock market or mutual fund exposure at all and their financial savings are limited to deposits in banks, tax-free bonds, insurance policies and instruments like National Savings Certificate.

The direct equity investments for a few are limited to unlisted companies, including those owned by their families.

BJP President Amit Shah has disclosed a long list of listed and unlisted shares in his name and in the name of his spouse. The listed shares in his name, totalling over Rs 17.5 crore, include companies from Aditya Birla Group, Bajaj, L&T, Tata and both Reliance groups, as also several PSUs.

Congress chief Rahul Gandhi has disclosed equity holding in Young Indian and investments in several mutual funds. The portfolio of his mother and senior party leader Sonia Gandhi includes equity shares of Young Indian and Maruti Technical Services Pvt Ltd and mutual fund units of HDFC, Kotak, Motilal Oswal and Reliance MF.

Nationalist Congress Party’s Supriya Sule, daughter of veteran leader Sharad Pawar, has got unlisted shares worth over Rs 1 crore and listed shares worth over Rs 6 crore, besides some mutual funds. The listed shares include those of Adani Group firms, the two Reliance groups, several Tata firms and even Kingfisher Airlines as also of some other companies from the erstwhile UB Group, including United Spirits which was sold by defaulter businessman Vijay Mallya to global liquor giant Diageo Plc. Kingfisher shares have long been delisted from the stock exchanges, though they quoted at above Rs 300 apiece once. The stocks eventually slipped below Rs 1 and trading was eventually suspended in 2014-end after mounting troubles for the erstwhile luxury airline had led to its closure.

Union minister and BJP candidate from Nagpur Nitin Gadkari has equity shares of Purti Power and Sugar Ltd, among other investments.

Poonam Mahajan, BJP candidate from Mumbai North Central, has disclosed listed equity investments by her spouse in Kingfisher Airlines, as also in Reliance Industries, TCS, Vodafone Idea Cellular and Reliance Power. Her Congress rival Priya Dutt has listed several mutual fund and portfolio schemes totalling about Rs 14.92 crore, while the listed shares disclosed in the name of her spouse include Reliance Industries, Reliance Infra and Reliance Power. Congress candidate from Mumbai South, Murli Deora, has disclosed multiple bonds, structured market products, PMS account, mutual funds and FMPs (fixed maturity plans).

Actress-turned-politician Urmila Matondkar, Congress candidate from Mumbai North, has disclosed Rs 28.28 crore worth investment in shares, bonds and mutual funds and PMS (portfolio management service) investments worth about Rs 6 crore, but the individual stocks/units were not disclosed.

Jaya Prada, another former actress and the BJP candidate from Rampur in Uttar Pradesh, has also disclosed investments in some listed companies such as Energy Development Company Ltd (which has got her political mentor Amar Singh as a promoter), Coal India, HDFC Bank, ITC, MCX and Reliance Industries. Actor-politician Raj Babbar, the Congress candidate from Fatehpur Sikri, has investments in IL&FS Transportation Networks Ltd.

Among other Uttar Pradesh candidates, Union minister and BJP leader Satyapal Singh has disclosed investments worth Rs 1.5 lakh in mutual funds and bonds in his name and some equity shares held by his spouse including of Reliance Capital and Reliance Industries.

Another union minister V K Singh and his spouse have also invested in various mutual funds.

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Agencies
May 26,2020

In a startling revelation, cybersecurity researchers have claimed that a hacker has posted personal details of nearly 2.9 crore Indian job seekers at one of the hacking forums on the Dark Web for free.

As part of the regular sweep over the Deep Web and Dark Web, researchers from cybersecurity firm Cyble came across an interesting item, where a threat actor posted 2.3GB (zipped) file on one of the hacking forums.

"The leak actually has a lot of personal details of millions of Indians Job seekers from different states," Cyble said in its blog on Friday.

This breach includes sensitive information such as email, phone, home address, qualification and work experience etc from job seekers spanning across states, from New Delhi to Mumbai and Bengaluru. 

Cybercriminals are always on the lookout for such personal information to conduct various nefarious activities such as identity thefts, scams, and corporate espionage.

"It appears to have originated from a resume aggregator service given the sheer volume and detailed information," it added.

Cyble indexed this information at ‘AmIbreached.com; – Cyble's data breach monitoring and notification platform.

Cyble researchers have identified a sensitive data breach on the dark web where an actor has leaked personal details of nearly 29 million Indian job seekers from various states. 

"Cyble's team is still investigating this further and will be updating their article as they bring more facts to the surface,” it said in a statement.

Cyble said it has acquired the leaked data. 

The same cyber security firm earlier exposed that Bengaluru-based edtech firm Unacademy was hacked.

According to Cyble researchers, nearly 22 million Unacademy user accounts were affected and the data was dumped and sold on Dark Web.

'We would like to assure our users that no sensitive information such as financial data or location has been breached," said Hemesh Singh, Co- Founder and CTO, Unacademy, in a statement.

In April, hackers sold personal data of a whopping 267 million Facebook users for just Rs 41,500 (approximately 500 Euros) that includes email addresses, names, Facebook IDs, dates of birth and phone numbers.

No passwords of the 267 million Facebook users were exposed by the hacker, according to Cyble.

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News Network
February 13,2020

New Delhi, Feb 13: Tibetan spiritual leader the Dalai Lama has congratulated AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal for his party's stupendous victory in the Delhi Assembly polls, saying the people of the national capital will continue to benefit from his leadership.

Responding to the Dalai Lama's statement, Kejriwal in a tweet on Wednesday said, "Am humbled by the kind words and blessings from His Holiness The Dalai Lama. Thank you very much @DalaiLama."

Referring to the Happiness Curriculum for government schools in Delhi, the Dalai Lama said he has a deep admiration for the efforts the AAP government has made towards "shaping better, happier human beings with improved values".

"These measures will have a positive impact on children's overall education, as well as helping the poor to fulfil their dreams of improving their lives," he said.

He also lauded the AAP government's initiative to incorporate aspects of inner mental development into the school curriculum.

"Through such initiatives, you are showing a path to the rest of India," the Dalai Lama added.

In a near-repeat performance of 2015, the Aam Aadmi Party on Tuesday retained power with a stunning victory, winning 62 of the 70 assembly seats and leaving the BJP with just eight seats.

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News Network
March 11,2020

New Delhi, Mar 11: Jyotiraditya Scindia, the Madhya Pradesh politician whose surprise exit from the Congress has brought the Kamal Nath government to the brink of collapse, joined the Bharatiya Janata Party on Wednesday. Scindia joined the BJP at an event in national capital Delhi in the presence of party chief JP Nadda.

Scindia, who was warmly welcomed by Nadda, described 10 March, the day that he exited from the Congress as one of the two life-changing days of his life. The first, he said, was 30 September 2001 when he lost his father. Scindia underscored that the Congress was not the party that it had been and had been living in denial.

Scindia had ended his 18-year-old association with the Congress on Tuesday after meetings with Home Minister Amit Shah and Prime Minister Narendra Modi.

Scindia’s exit from the Congress was followed by resignation letters by about 22 MLAs who had been sequestered in Karnataka. The resignation letters were, however, sent to the Governor and not the assembly speaker, and threatens to upend the Kamal Nath government which has a wafer-thin majority.

If the resignations are accepted, the effective strength of the MP assembly will come down to 206, leaving the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) with a slender majority beyond the halfway mark of 103 with its 107 MLAs. For now, the Congress is trying to persuade the MLAs to not pull down the state government.

In his resignation letter to Congress chief Sonia Gandhi that Scindia put out on Twitter soon after, he alluded to his discomfort in the party over the last year or so. “...as you well know, this is a path that has been drawing itself out over the last year,” he had written in his letter.

It was seen as a reference to the Congress settling for Kamal Nath as the chief minister after the 2018 state elections though it was Scindia who had led from the front to oust the BJP from Madhya Pradesh. Scindia’s supporters had hoped that the Congress would tell Kamal Nath to give up his second charge - as the party chief in the state - but this also didn’t happen.

The first hint that something was amiss came in November last year when Scindia removed a reference to the Congress in his Twitter bio and instead wrote “public servant and cricket enthusiast”. He had then explained the change to an effort to make the Twitter bio shorter.

Jyotyiraditya Scindia’s aunt Yashodhara Raje Scindia appeared to declare soon after that the 49-year-old would join the BJP when she welcomed his resignation, calling it “ghar wapsi” or homecoming. “Jyotiraditya was being neglected in Congress,” Yashodhara Raje Scindia said.

Scindia’s grandmother, Vijaya Raje Scindia, was one of the founders of the Jana Sangh, the precursor to the BJP. His aunt Vasundhara Raje is a former Union minister and ex-chief minister of Rajasthan and another aunt Yashodhara Raje is a former minister in the Madhya Pradesh cabinet.

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