Contributions to 'Bharat Ke Veer' exempted from income tax

All contributions to 'Bharat Ke Veer', a home ministry fund which aids families of paramilitary personnel who died fighting extremists, have been exempted from the income tax, Home Minister Rajnath Singh said Thursday.

The trust was formed with film star Akshay Kumar and former national Badminton champion Pullela Gopichand, among others. "Ministry of finance @FinMinIndia has now given approval to @BharatKeVeer Trust under 80(G) which in effect means that all contributions to the trust will be exempted under the income tax. I thank the ministry and FM Sh. @ArunJaitley for the exemption to #BharatKeVeer Trust," Singh tweeted.

Singh said the home ministry had taken up the Bharat Ke Veer initiative in April last year, and the success of it has been stupendous.

Singh said the initiative has now been formalised into a registered trust for providing a platform to all citizens to contribute and provide assistance to the families of martyred paramilitary personnel.

"The @BharatKeVeer Trust has been formed with seven trustees headed by the union home secretary. Noted film actor Shri @akshaykumar and former national Badminton champion Pullela Gopichand have also been included in the trust as trustees," he said in another tweet.

General public can visit the application and the website Bharat Ke Veer and make a contribution to support the families of the jawans who died in the line of duty.

The monetary contributions made on the website go straight to the bank accounts of martyred soldiers' families.

The main objective of the portal (bharatkeveer.gov.in) is to enable the public to help the families of soldiers by donating money online directly to the individual braveheart's account or to Bharat Ke Veer corpus.

Bravehearts from Central Reserve Police Force, Border Security Force, Central Industrial Security Force, Indo-Tibetan Border Police Force, Sashastra Seema Bal, Assam Rifles, National Disaster Response Force and National Security Guards are included in the portal for contribution.