Central Government employees asked to declare assets under Lokpal Act, 2013

Department of Personnel and Training (DoPT) has asked all Central government employees to declare their assets and liabilities under the provisions of Lokpal and Lokayuktas Act, 2013. In this regards DoPT has also made mandatory for them to disclose deposits in foreign banks.
Earlier in Dember 2014, DoPT had extended the date of declaring assets till April 2015 from 31 December 2014 as per the Public Servants (Furnishing of Information and Annual Return of Assets and Liabilities and the Limits for Exemption of Assets in Filing Returns) Amendment Rules, 2014.
This rules were issued in September 2014.
Some facts about rules

• Central government employees must file the returns of their assets and liabilities, including of their spouse and dependent family members every year on March 31 on or before July 31 of that year.
• These declarations will come under the Lokpal Act and in addition to various services rules.
• In this regards all Group A, B, and C employees will declare the assets under the new rules. It should be noted that there are about 26,29, 913 employees in these three categories.
• As per the rules, assets and liabilities includes details of cash in hand, bank deposits, investment in bonds, debentures, shares and units in companies or mutual funds, insurance policies, provident fund, personal loans and advance given to any person or entity, among others.
• The employees also need to declare motor vehicles, aircraft, yachts or ships, gold and silver jewellery and bullion possessed by them, their spouses and dependent children.

Month: Current Affairs - December, 2014