In a major embarrassment for Indian account holders in HSBC Switzerland, a trove of secret documents has been published that reveals their names and account balances. Labelled Swiss Leaks, the investigation has revealed 1,195 Indian customers, roughly double the 628 names that French authorities gave to India in 2010. The total balance of Rs. 25,000 crore ($4.03 billion) in accounts held by Indians is also staggering and is bound to increase the pressure on the government.   read more

The Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) has been put on the defensive just days before the Delhi assembly election, with a breakway group of AAP accusing the anti-corruption party of dubious funding. The group – AAP Volunteer Action Group – provided details to the media of four cheques totalling Rs. 2 crores ($325,000) that were allegedly received by AAP in April last year from four companies.   read more

The government will transfer welfare benefits worth at least Rs. 33,000 crore ($5.35 billion) directly into the banks accounts of beneficiaries in the next six months, Financial Services Secretary Hasmukh Adhia told reporters. This is aimed at plugging the leakage of welfare benefits by cutting out frauds who siphon crores of rupees from welfare schemes. This is expected to reduce the fiscal deficit over the medium term.   read more

It’s tough being India’s richest man. Mukesh Ambani, worth an estimated $20 billion, must have several hundred thousand people on his payroll, but the names of only two raised eyebrows this week. The news that two senior politicians Ravi Shankar Prasad and Manish Tewari were earlier paid around $100,000 each per year for ‘legal consultancy’ has shocked many even in India, a country inured to the cosy relationship between business and politics.   read more

The recent hullabaloo about ‘black’ money stashed by Indians in Swiss bank accounts has certainly helped to focus the government’s efforts on recovering these overseas funds, but the country’s interests may be better served by looking at the cash economy inside India. According to the Special Investigation Team (SIT), Rs. 4,479 crore ($715 million) is held by Indians in secret Swiss bank accounts, but illegal cash inside the country is more than 3 times larger: Rs. 14,958 crore ($2.3 billion).   read more

The Trinamool Congress (TMC) is facing mounting pressure over the Saradha chit fund scam, with one more party MP arrested on Friday, bring to three the number of its leaders behind bars. With growing calls for Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee to resign, her party claimed that the Central Bureau of Investigation (CBI) was being used by the central government to “settle political scores”.   read more

Narayanaswami Srinivasan may have got a clean chit from the Supreme Court over match-fixing, but the court pointed out that he did not take action against a player who had violated the code of conduct. With Srinivasan’s son-in-law Gurunath Meiyappan, IPL COO Sundar Raman and Raj Kundra (co-owner of Rajasthan Royals) indicted for allegedly cronying up to punters, the court needs to restore the public’s faith in cricket by cleaning the Augean stables that is the BCCI.   read more

In Puri, Odisha, reporters were enraged to allegedly find Rs. 200 ($3.30) each in the media kit envelopes provided to them at a press conference addressed by Pinaki Mishra, the ruling Biju Janata Dal MP. Several journalists lodged a police complaint against Mishra and BJD MLA Maheswar Mohanty, accusing them of attempting to bribe the media.   read more

The Rs. 20,000 crore Saradha scam in West Bengal shows no signs of slowing down. A government agency that tracks corporate frauds has reportedly called for a CBI probe against state sports minister Madan Mitra and Kolkata Police chief Surajit Kar Purkayastha. The sports minister allegedly took money from Saradha chairman Sudipta Sen to repair temples in his constituency and to hold a football match in Kolkata featuring Argentine soccer star Lionel Messi.   read more

The Modi government continued its austerity drive on Thursday, this time banning first-class air travel by top bureaucrats to cut down on unnecessary expenditure and reduce the fiscal deficit. The government also barred ministries from making new financial commitments, purchasing new vehicles, creating new posts and holding conferences at five-star hotels.   read more

The government has started filing charges against individuals having accounts in Swiss banks, which will allow it to disclose names of those who have allegedly stashed black money abroad, amid media speculation that some prominent politicians may figure on this list. But the challenge will be to convince everyone that the government is acting impartially, and not using these foreign accounts to selectively target political opponents.   read more

The crucial election in Maharashtra is clearly wearing politicians down. Just before the state went to the polls, former CM Prithviraj Chavan reportedly admitted that he could not take action against his Adarsh scam-accused predecessors as the Congress would have been “decimated in Maharashtra”. In a damning interview to The Telegraph, Chavan further reportedly claimed that he did not order proper investigations against NCP's Ajit Pawar in order to keep the Congress-NCP alliance intact.   read more

The Congress state government in Haryana has officially legitimised the controversial land deal between party chief Sonia Gandhi’s son-in-law Robert Vadra and real-estate giant DLF Universal Ltd. Prime Minister Narendra Modi urged the Election Commission on Monday to look into the state administration’s decision taken prior to a crucial election, where the ruling Congress party is fighting a tough battle to win votes.   read more

J Jayalalithaa, the chief of the AIADMK, has become the first chief minister to be forced from office after being convicted of corruption. The 66-year-old politician has been sentenced to 4 years in jail and fined Rs. 100 crore ($16.7 million), after a Bangalore court found her guilty of corruption during her first term as chief minister of Tamil Nadu from 1991 to 1996.   read more

A major deadline is looming for the 5 million or so bureaucrats in the Indian government. They have to file returns declaring all their assets by September 15 under the new anti-corruption Lokpal law. According to the form, officials need to declare any motor vehicles, aircraft, yachts or ships, gold and silver jewellery and bullion possessed by them, their spouses and dependent children.   read more

It is a poorly kept secret that India’s massive food distribution system (PDS) is riddled with inefficiency and corruption, but the scale of the problem continues to surprise. The state administration in Bihar has now discovered almost 800,000 fake ration cards that could have cost the exchequer Rs. 3.23 crore ($538,000) every month.   read more