The Central Government has rolled back the previous notification that brought the gems and jewellery under the ambit of Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA).

According to the notification which has been rolled back, any dealer of precious metals, precious stones and other high-value goods with a turnover of Rs. 2 crore or more in a financial year was to be covered under the Act. The limit of Rs. 2 crore was to be calculated on the basis of the previous year's turnover, according to the notification.

As a consequence of the above, various compliances under the PMLA were required to be undertaken by the gems and jewellery sector, which was to be overseen by the DGGSTI. Critical amongst these, were the requirement under Rule 9 of the PMLA Rules, whereby a reporting entity must verify the identity of its clients, via a KYC process, for every transaction of Rs. 50,000 or more (whether conducted as a single transaction or several transactions that appear to be connected).

Commenting on the decision Nitin Khandelwal, Chairman, GJF said, “This is really a great news for the industry and we are thankful to Honourable PM Narendra Modi ji, FM Arun Jaitley ji and Amit Shah ji. Over the past 20 days we had met each and every department and key persons in the Government. The support that we got from various associations and chain store owners on this concern was phenomenal. This is really a proud moment for our industry and we look forward to good business during festive season.”