Federal Minister for Industries and Production Hammad Azhar informed theSenate on Friday that the incumbent government has taken various steps forthe elimination of the Hawala or Hundi system for having transparentfinancial transactions in the country.
While speaking in the parliament, the minister said that the government wastaking the matter of money-laundering seriously. He also asked theopposition to stop taking a defensive position on the matter.
In a written reply to a question asked in the parliament, the minister saidthat measures against such financial transactions have been taken throughamendments in Foreign Exchange Regulation Act (FERA) 1947, in February 2020.
Some of the measures taken under these amendments include increasing theprevious imprisonment sentence of two years to the imprisonment of fiveyears.
Other measures taken towards this goal include removing the requirement ofwritten complaints from State Bank of Pakistan (SBP), for tribunals to takecognizance of offenses, for unauthorized and illegal foreign exchangeoperators like hundi and hawala operators while the time to conclude trialhas been fixed for tribunal like session court is now bound to decide thecase within six months, the minister informed.
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He said that these FERA amendments on operations against hundi have enabledFederal Investigation Agency (FIA) to expedite identification andregistration of hawala and hundi cases as well as the process of conductingraids, seizing relevant evidence, and arresting the offenders.
He said that in July 2020, the existing memorandum of understaning (MOU)between Federal Investigation Agency (FIA) and SBP for the mutual operationwas revised aimed at establishing a more robust mechanism in the form of acore coordination committee to further enhance the on-going cooperationbetween both the agencies for the identification, registration andinvestigation of cases against hawala and hundi.
He also informed that the FIA and SBP, in close collaboration launched arobust public awareness campaign across the country with a view todiscourage the public from using hawala or hundi to encourage the public toidentify and report illegal hawala or hundi cases to FIA and also to deterhawala or hundi operators from continuing their activities.
