New Delhi, March 16 (IANS) With anti-terror operations increasingly focusing on the financing of terrorists, the government Tuesday said it has set up the Financial Intelligence Unit to keep track of suspicious bank transactions and pass on such information to law enforcement agencies.
“Banks are stipulated to file suspicious transaction reports pertaining to remittances/withdrawals from bank accounts and in respect of account holder,” Minister of State for Finance Namo Narain Meena said in a written reply to a question raised in the Rajya Sabha.

Meena informed parliament that India’s central bank Reserve Bank of India had issued guidelines to all banks in December last year that before opening any new account, they must ensure that the identity of the customer does not match with any person with known criminal background or with banned entities such as an individual terrorist or a terrorist organisation.

Financial Intelligence Unit, India (FIU-IND), has been set-up to receive information relating to certain types of transactions including suspicious transaction from financial sector, analyse received information and disseminate information in appropriate cases to relevant intelligence/law enforcement agencies, he said.

The minister informed parliament that the unit has received certain suspicious reports on account of matches of certain details of terrorists whose names are appearing in UN Consolidated lists and other lists.

“In most of the cases the matches were partial or incomplete,” he said.

“Enhanced due diligence was conducted by FIU-IND and thereafter information was disseminated in appropriate case to relevant law enforcement/intelligence agencies,” he said.

As reported by the RBI, two bank accounts have been frozen under the provisions of the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act, 1967, he said.

The RBI’s directive came last year in the wake of a list of entities with terror links sent by the UN Security Council to India’s external affairs ministry and also requesting banks to update their concerned list accordingly.

In a letter to the chairmen and chief executives of such banks, the RBI also asked them to update their list of account-holders to check for such terror links and follow these guidelines when a person or an entity opens a new account.

“It should be ensured that names of the proposed customer do not appear in the list. Further, banks should scan all existing accounts to ensure that no account is held by or linked to any of the entities or individuals included in the list,” said the letter.

Home Minister P. Chidambaram said recently that the government was closely monitoring financial transactions of suspected terrorists and stressed on combating the financing of terror operations.