Over 2,600 cases pending adjudication under repealed FERA

It may be seven years since the Foreign Exchange Regulation Act (FERA) was repealed, but there are over 2,600 cases in which the adjudicating process is pending, besides 4,000 other cases which are pending prosecution.

Under the current law, Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) which replaced the FERA, there are 1,351 cases which are pending adjudication process.

According to the Finance Ministry data 2009-10 updated till October, a total of 2,661 cases are awaiting adjudication proceedings under FERA.

Out of 4,083 other cases which were under prosecution process -- 2,300 were for non-payment of penalties and 1,783 were for substantive offences, it said.

The department is said to have completed adjudication proceedings in 1,127 cases under FERA during the period.

According to the data, the number of cases of adjudication proceedings initiated by the Directorate of Enforcement under FEMA, 1999 has gone up in the recent past.

The ED has initiated adjudication proceedings in 297 cases between January and October, against 269 during 2007-08. The Directorate had in 2008-09 initiated a highest of 380 adjudicating proceedings, the data said.

However, as many as 1,351 cases were pending adjudication proceedings under the FEMA during 2009-10, the data said.