British Foreign Minister James Cleverly raised the duty quests on the BBC with Foreign Minister. S Jaishankar during a bilateral meeting, ahead of a meeting of G20 ministers.
Mr Jaishankar “forcefully told” his UK counterpart that all realities operating in India must misbehave with the law of the land, sources said. “All realities operating in India must misbehave completely with applicable laws and regulations,” the UK Foreign Minister was told, according to sources.
Last month, the Income tax department searched the BBC services in Delhi and Mumbai for three days over allegations of irregularities in levies, diversion of gains and non-compliance.
During the check, senior officers had to stay in the office overnight to respond to questions. The quests came weeks after the British public broadcaster vented a talkie that was critical of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s leadership of Gujarat during the 2002 insular screams.
After completing the check, the duty department claimed to have set up “several attestations (sic)” indicating that “duty has not been paid on certain remittances which haven’t been barred as income in India by the foreign realities of the group.”
The check had thrown up disagreement and inconsistencies on transfer pricing attestation, the duty department contended.
Days later, the British government explosively defended the BBC and its editorial freedom. “We stand up for the BBC. We fund the BBC. We suppose the BBC World Service is vital. We want the BBC to have that tract of freedom,” said David Rutley, Parliamentary Under-Secretary of the Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office.”
It criticises us (the government), it criticises the opposition party and we believe that the freedom they have is important. That freedom is crucial, and we want to be suitable to communicate its significance to our musketeers across the world, including the government in India,” he stressed.
The duty checks were extensively blamed by opposition parties, who accused the government of revenge against the BBC for the unflattering documentary.
Mr S Jaishankar’s Reply About The Same
The BBC’s two-part series named “India The Modi Question”, examines allegations that PM Modi, as Chief Minister of Gujarat, did not do enough to stop the 2002 screams-allegations that were dismissed by the Supreme Court.
The government used exigency powers to take down posts participating in the talkie in January. Foreign Minister Jaishankar, in an interview last week, said the timing of the BBC documentary is “not accidental” and denounced the narrative in the foreign media.
Suppose it-this is politics by other means. “Why is there suddenly a swell of reports, attention, and views? Will some of these effects not be again?”
Dr Jaishankar said, responding to a question. “I mean, do you misdoubt it? Look who the cheerleaders are. What’s passing is, just like I told you – this drip, drip, drip — how do you shape a veritably extreme image of India, of the government, of the BJP, of the Prime Minister.
I mean, this has been going on for a decade,” said Dr Jaishankar. The motive behind similar stories abroad was to foster the anti-India Movement, he said, challenging those behind the narrative to come to the political arena.
https://www.instagram.com/dissenttimes/