The Indian parliament has repeatedly asked the finance minister about the government’s plans for cryptocurrency. In July alone, the Ministry of Finance answered three sets of questions: two in Rajya Sabha, the upper house, and one in Lok Sabha, the lower house of the parliament.
Also read: Indian Finance Minister Addresses Crypto Proposal – Industry Responds
Government Aware Crypto Growing More Popular
Indian parliament member Shri R. K. Sinha last week directed some questions at the finance minister at a sitting of the Rajya Sabha regarding the “Law for banning usage of cryptocurrency.” He asked on July 23 “whether [the] government has taken notice of the growing popularity of cryptocurrency.” Replying to this parliamentary question, the Minister of State in the Ministry of Finance, Shri Anurag Singh Thakur, simply said: “Yes, Sir.”
The question about cryptocurrency’s popularity was also asked in Rajya Sabha a week prior. Parliament member Shri Dharmapuri Srinivas similarly asked the finance minister on July 16 “whether [the] government has taken note about [the] prevalence of cryptocurrency in the country.” Thakur also replied: “Taking note of the issue, the government has constituted an Inter-Ministerial Committee (IMC) under the chairmanship of Secretary (EA). The IMC has submitted the report to the government.”
The Secretary of Economic Affairs (EA) at the time was Subhash Chandra Garg. However, on July 24, Prime Minister Narendra Modi reshuffled his top-level bureaucrats and replaced Garg with Department of Investments and Public Asset Management Secretary Atanu Chakraborty as the new EA Secretary. Garg has been appointed the new Secretary of Ministry of Power.
The IMC was constituted on Nov. 2, 2017, to study all the aspects of cryptocurrency and providing recommendations. Its report, dated Feb. 28, was
