Archives for April 2022

NEW DELHI: Retail inflation soared to a 17-month high of 6.95% in March with the prices of most commodities soaring, data published by the National Statistical Office showed on Tuesday. It is the third straight month when the inflation remained above the Reserve Bank of India’s comfort zone of 6%. Retail inflation, measured by Consumer Price Index (CPI), was 6.07% in February and 6.01% in January. The CPI inflation was 5.52% in March 2021. 

Inflation in the ‘fuel and light’ category, however, grew at a slower pace of 7.5% in March (compared to 8.7% in February) as most of the price hikes in petrol, diesel and LPG happened in the later part of the month.

According to the latest data, the prices of most commodity groups touched multi-month highs — cereals and products (19 months), milk and products (16 months), vegetable (16 months), clothing (100 months), footwear (111 months), household goods and services (102 months), personal care (13 months) and food index (16 months).

Core inflation, or non-food non-fuel inflation, was at 6.4% in March compared to 5.8% in February. Core inflation is likely to see a broad-based rise as producers pass on cost pressures across segments, says rating agency Crisil. The poor are bearing the burden of inflation the most, given that food recorded the sharpest rise, Crisil adds.

Meanwhile, rural inflation showed a higher jump of 7.7% than urban inflation (6.12%). RBI in its recent monetary policy had said that its primary focus would be to contain inflation. The central bank also revised the 2022-23 inflation estimates to 5.7% from its earlier forecast of 4.5%. 

New Delhi: Subhash Shankar Parab, a key accused in the Rs 7,000 crore diamantaire Nirav Modi bank fraud case, was deported from Cairo on Tuesday after a long diplomatic and legal process, officials said here.

A CBI team had gone to Egypt’s capital to bring back 50-year-old Parab, who was allegedly kept in illegal confinement in a Cairo suburb by Modi, the fugitive diamantaire, they said.

The CBI had been chasing Parab, Deputy General Manager (Finance) in Modi’s Firestar Diamond and understood to be a key witness to the Letters of Undertaking (LoU) submitted to the Punjab National Bank (PNB) to siphon off over Rs 7,000 crore, they said.

Soon after the scam broke in 2018, Parab was one of the executives who went missing along with Modi’s family members and his uncle Mehul Choksi.

The latter found refuge in Antigua and Barbuda, a Carribbean island country, they said.

India had issued an Interpol Red Notice against Parab to track him and bring him back, they said.

India received information that Parab, a crucial link related to LoUs, was kept in illegal confinement by Modi’s men. He was taken from Dubai to Egypt, and India had expressed concerns for his safety, they said.

After a long diplomatic and legal process, the CBI managed to secure administrative extradition or deportation of Parab, who could spill the beans on the country’s biggest banking scam allegedly perpetrated by Modi and Choksi with a combined loss of Rs 13,000 crore, they said.

The duo is wanted for allegedly siphoning off Rs 13,500 crore of public money from the state-run PNB, using the Letters of Undertaking.

While Modi is in a London prison after repeated denial of bail and is contesting extradition to India, Choksi had taken the citizenship of Antigua and Barbuda in 2017 using the Citizenship by Investment programme even before fleeing India in the first week of January 2018. The scam came to light subsequently.

The CBI has charged a PNB official Gokulnath Shetty, along with others, with allegedly helping Modi and Choksi to perpetrate the scam by issuing LOUs to their firms, based on which they took loans from banks abroad.

The investigations revealed that messages for fraudulent LoUs were sent to overseas banks by misusing Society for Worldwide Interbank Financial Telecommunications (SWIFT), an international messaging system for banking, and without making their subsequent entries in PNB’s internal software Finacle’, thus bypassing any scrutiny of such funds in the bank, they said.

An LoU is a guarantee given by an issuing bank to Indian banks having branches abroad to grant a short-term credit to the applicant. In case of default, the bank issuing the LoU has to pay the liability to the credit-giving bank along with accruing interest.

The companies of Modi and Choksi took loans from banks abroad on the basis of these LoUs but did not repay them, thus transferring the liability on PNB.

It is alleged that senior officials of the PNB, including the then CEO and MD, did not implement the circulars and caution notices issued by the Reserve Bank of India regarding safeguarding of the SWIFT operation and misrepresented the factual position to the apex bank.

Reconciliation of the Core Banking Solutions (CBS) and SWIFT messages was not done despite repeated RBI circulars, caution notices and questionnaires, the CBI has alleged.

Bengaluru: Federation of Karnataka State Lorry Owners and Agents Association on Monday threatened to launch a transport strike from May 1 onwards if the state government does not roll back the “unscientific” price hike imposed on the transport sector before 30 April.

Addressing a press conference, the association Secretary C Nandish Reddy said, “Since 1 April, older vehicles are subjected to 16 times more fees which has taken a toll on the lives of poor people. Moreover, the validity of fitness certificates have been reduced, throwing the transport sector off balance.”

He alleged that the central government earlier imposed a fine of Rs 100 to Rs 500 over violation of traffic rules for heavy vehicles, which has now soared to Rs 5000 to Rs 25,000 and added that the motor vehicle officials are taking advantage of it.

Association members Chenna Reddy, Sairam, Pandian and Chandrashekhar were present in the press meet.

File Photo of Qutab Minar

New Delhi: Former additional director general of the ASI B R Mani on Monday dubbed as “mere imagination” the VHP’s claim that the Qutab Minar was originally a ‘Vishnu Stambh’, and cautioned that any tampering with structures on the complex would result in the revocation of the Unesco world heritage status accorded to it in 1993.

Mani, however, said that it was a fact that 27 Hindu temples were demolished at the site and their remains were used in building Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque and the Qutab Minar as well but the demand for rebuilding these temples was “meaningless” as there was no trace of the location of these temples at the site.

Mani, who had been with the Archaeological Survey of India (ASI) for over three decades, is currently the vice chairman of Indian Archaeological Society which promotes and spreads knowledge about archaeology in its all aspects.

The Vishva Hindu Parisad (VHP) on Saturday demanded that the government rebuild all the 27 Hindu temples at the Qutab Minar complex and allow Hindu rituals to resume at the site.

The outfit’s national spokesperson Vinod Bansal also claimed that the 73-meter-high Qutab Minar was originally a ‘Vishnu Stambh’ on a temple of Lord Vishnu constructed during the times of a Hindu ruler.

Asked about the VHP claim, Mani told PTI, “I also believe that there were 27 temples. There are evidence to support it. Nobody has any doubt about it. But nobody knows where were those 27 temples located, what was their form, (structure) plan.”

He said it’s written on Qutbu’d-Din Aibak’s inscription that Quwwat ul Islam mosque was built using the debris of the 27 temples demolished at the site.

“Remains of the temples are spread all over the site, but no elevation, plinth, or any other thing was found there that could have helped trace the location of those temples. Something should have been be found like Adhisthana (base platform),” he said.

“They (Muslim rulers) destroyed everything when they invaded and built the Quwwat-ul-Islam mosque and erected the Minar on it, using the debris of the Hindu temples that they destroyed,” he said.

Hence there is “no meaning” of reconstructing them, he said.

“And, if we do any tempering with the structures at Qutab Complex, Unesco world heritage site tag given to it will be withdrawn, and the site will be placed in the endangered list,” he said, “Be it the VHP or any other party, no one would want this to happen.”

Mani had directed 20 archaeological excavations in India, including at the Ram Janmabhoomi-Babri mosque site in Ayodhya, during his 31-year-long service at the ASI.

Rejecting the VHP’s claim that the Qutab Minar was originally a ‘Vishnu Stambh’ built on a Vishnu Temple, Mani said that a 20-25-foot-deep excavation had been carried out at the spot to strengthen the monument’s foundation in 1967 but no trace of any temple was found.

“It’s mere imagination. There was nothing there, no temple was found there,” he said.

The ‘Vishnu Stambh’ is already there standing at the site in the form of an iron pillar, he said.

“The Minar cannot be a stambh like Ashokan pillars, which are monolithic, made of stone or iron. Minar is completely different structure,” he said.

Several such kinds of minaret of the same period are there in Central Asia for any body to see, he said.

Pune: Vishwa Hindu Parishad (VHP) leader Sadhvi Saraswati has urged Hindu youth to carry swords to avoid situations like the exodus of Kashmiri Pandits from the Valley due to atrocities committed by Pakistan-backed terrorists, depicted in ‘The Kashmir Files’.

Addressing a rally in north Maharashtra’s Dhule city, some 340 km from Pune, on Sunday on the occasion of Ram Navami, she said that possessing weapons was the “aan, baan, aur shaan (pride and honour)” of Hindus.

Speaking about the displacement of Kashmiri Pandits, Sadhvi Saraswati said, “Are we waiting for the day when we will also be ousted from our houses…That time questions will be asked, why Hindus, Brahmins why did not you pick up the sword, why didn’t you fight the war, why didn’t you fight for your rights.”

“I urge you to pick up swords. If you can buy mobile phones and laptops worth Rs 1 lakh, also buy and carry a sword worth Rs 1,000. Possessing weapons is aan, baan aur shaan of Hindus,” she added.