MOIA to amend rules for emigration job ads after terror plot
By IANSTuesday, November 17, 2009
NEW DELHI - Taking serious note of how Tahawwur Hussain Rana, the accomplice of suspected Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist David Coleman Headley, issued emigration job advertisements in English dailies, the Ministry of Overseas Indian Affairs is planning to amend the rules for issuing such ads.
Under the rules, the Protector of Emigrants (PoE) has to monitor all emigration job advertisements for Emigration Check Required (ECR) countries such as Afghanistan, Iraq, and Yemen among 18 countries.
The ministry is now planning to get the PoE to monitor such job ads even for the ECNR - or Emigration Check Not Required - countries such as the US and European nations.
“Presently, monitoring by the Protector of Emigrants (PoE) is required for placing job advertisements for Emigration Check Required (ECR) countries,” said the Overseas Indian Affairs Minister Vayalar Ravi here.
Ravi said the ministry was looking at ways to make the same rule applicable for the recruitment in other countries as well.
“An amendment is required to make the rule possible,” Ravi said.
According to police, Rana had stayed in Kochi, Kerala, as an emigration consultant along with his “wife” Samraz Akhtar for two days in a five-star hotel.
He also posted an advertisement in an English daily saying: “Our principal world famous emigration consultant Dr. Rana from Chicago is in your town.”
Ravi said that the district superintendent of police (SP) should examine the emigration job ads that appear in the media in their areas.
The state governments should investigate the “authenticity” of such advertisements, the minister said.
