Over 1,000 NRIs knock on door of Punjab Commission in 4 years
Monday, 09/11/2015
http://epaper.dailypostindia.com/Details.aspx?id=143963&boxid=58148&uid=&dat=2015-11-09
Chandigarh : More than 1,100 Punjabi Non Residential Indians (NRIs) from over 40 countries have knocked on the door of Punjab State Commission for NRIs in past four years, registering complaints on various difficulties they were facing, including property disputes, domestic violence and other issues.
Data shows that the lone of its kind Commission for NRIs in the country, has dealt with nearly 1,126 cases relating to the Punjabi NRIs during the period between November 30, 2011 and October 16 this year. Interestingly, the figures are topped by the Punjabi NRIs residing in Canada with 341 complaints, followed by USA 235, UK 311, Australia 85, Italy 40, UAE 29, Germany 22, New Zealand 21, Singapore 15, Muscat 12 and Philippines with 10 such cases.
Apart from these countries, NRIs have registered their grievances from European countries including Austria, Belgium, Denmark, France, Greece, Netherland, Norway, Spain, Sweden and Switzerland while rest of the matters belong to the Punjabis NIRs from Afghanistan, Abu Dhabi, Nigeria, Bahrain, Qatar, Egypt, Hong Cong, Iraq, Kuwait, Libya, Lebanon, Malaysia, Malta, Michigan, Pakistan, Saudi Arabia, Singapore, Uganda and others. According to the tally, maximum cases relating to Punjabi NRIs are about the property disputes with a total 560 cases, 204 cases relating to matrimonial disputes including domestic violence, exploitation while rest matters are about murders illegal detention of Punjabis in foreign countries.
Talking to Daily Post, Commission’s Chairperson Justice (retd) R K Garg said, “Most of the complaints have been filed by the women and maximum are about the domestic violence incidents. Besides, there are property disputes and false registration of FIR against the NRIs.” We have taken suo moto cognisance in 43 matters relating to attacks on Punjabi NRIs in these countries, murdered Punjabis, girls forced into flash trade, prostitution, NRIs duped by travel and recruiting agents abroad, deserted women, bounded labour detention and attacks on Sikhs’ holy places in Pakistan, he added.
Justice (retd) Garg said that they have succeeded in seeking intervention of higher foreign authorities in such cases, registration of FIRs in such cases; however, it would not be possible to give details of exact number of FIRs registered into NRIs matters after our intervention. The Commission has helped a number of such NRIs getting back their properties, were encroached by the wrongdoers here. Recently, a Punjabi NRI from Jalandhar was shot dead in Philippines, we requested the Ministry of External Affairs for bringing his dead body here in India, added the Chairperson. Out of the total 1126 cases, 783 were disposed of while 343 are pending, investigation is going on the pending cases, necessary actions would be recommended in these cases after going through the factual position, he added.
Maximum numbers of the cases have been reported by the NRIs belonging to Ludhiana district with 204 petitions with the Commission, followed by the Jalandhar district 166, SAS Nagar 110, Hoshiarpur 71, Amritsar 69, Moga 58, SBS Nagar 56, Patiala 47, Ropar and Kapurthala 46 each and Gurdaspur with 38 petitions.
Commission seeks more teeth
However, the officials in the Commission feel that more teeth should be provided to the Commission at this stage including amendment in the Act, more and permanent staff and allocation of more funds. The Act should be amended focussing on “Commission for benefits of NRIs” to “Commission related to NRIs” as right now we could recommend action against the wrongdoers on complaints of NRIs but we don’t have power to recommend anything against the erring NRIs, Garg added. Besides, the Commission should be empowered with some provision relating to put marks on annual confidential reports (ACRs) of the investigation cell staffs, will make them more accountable to the Commission as right now they are accountable to the Director General of Police only, said S Chattopadhyaya, Member-cum-ADGP, Punjab State Commission for NRIs.
Apart from this, the response from Union of India too is not pleasing these days. We have written to them many times but they have adopted a different mechanism these days to deal with the matter relating to NRIs as the Centre says that the victims should approach them directly instead of going through us. The state government should also intervene into the matter as the Punjab is the only state in the country to have Commission to deal with the cases relating to the NRIs, the official said.
