INDIAN GOVERNMENT REVIEWS POLICY ON CRYPTO ASSETS

INDIAN GOVERNMENT CLARIFIES STATUS OF CRYPTOCURRENCY TRADING

■ The Lower House of Parliament in India has questioned the Indian Ministry of Finance on several subjects concerning cryptocurrency in the country.

The Minister of State for the Ministry of Finance Shri Pankaj Chaudary was questioned about the “status of cryptocurrency trading in India” and he replied “This information is not collected by the government”.

His answer reiterates that the government does not collect information on the number of cryptocurrency exchanges or traders in India and has not been informed of any fraud conducted by any exchanges.

The Minister asked about “the current regulatory regime surrounding cryptocurrency and its trading”, explained that all entities regulated by the central bank, the Reserve Bank of India (RBI), have been advised to carry out customer due diligence processes in line with a number of regulations, including know your customer (KYC) standards, anti-money laundering (AML) law, Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA), and Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) for overseas remittances.

When the Finance Minister of India was questioned about the laws in place to protect crypto traders and investors from fraud and other misdemeanors in its trading. He responded “depending upon the nature of the fraud, various laws including the Indian Penal Code 1860 are in place for protection against fraud”.

Continuing, the minister said that the Indian government does not consider cryptocurrencies legal tender or coin and will take all measures to eliminate use of these crypto-assets in financing illegitimate activities or as part of the payment system.

He further stated that according to the committee constituted under the former Finance Secretary which recommended in its report that “all private cryptocurrencies, except any cryptocurrency issued by the state, be prohibited in India.”

The Minister also revealed that the crypto cabinet note is ready for consideration. However, the crypto bill is not listed on the list of items to be considered in this parliament session.●