India wants three lakh kilometres of ‘Colour Shift Security Thread’ to print its currency notes but has specified to global contractors that such a job should be fire-walled from any operations with Pakistan and China, including the exclusion of nationals from the two countries.
The ‘Colour Shift Security Thread’ is a major security feature to ensure the authenticity of a currency note to distinguish it from counterfeit ones. Government sources say the source of all counterfeit Indian currency is mainly Pakistan, with links to China in certain cases.
A government document reviewed by News18 stipulates that the supply job be fire-walled from Pakistan and China. “The product supplied to India should be exclusive and should not be supplied to other countries. The operations carried out in Pakistan or China, if any, will be suitably firewalled from the contract or operations with the government of India,” the document has clearly specified.
It also says that employees who have previously worked or been posted in Pakistan or China, are Pakistani or Chinese nationals or trace their origin to the two countries will not be engaged by the company for this project. “The production facilities and transport of the raw material should be adequately secured to prevent pilferage and to circumvent threats from anti-national elements,” it says.
In such contracts, either the supplier is abroad or if the product is being manufactured in India, it is under a licence from a foreign manufacturer who holds intellectual property rights and does a technology collaboration. “If a company is found indulging in acts inimical or prejudicial to India’s national security or interest, the contract will be liable to be terminated,” the document stated.
The government document also specified that it will be mandatory for the company to inform the government of India, the Ministry of Finance, the Department of Economic Affairs and the Security Paper Mill about any changes in management control or ownership pattern of the company or location of the company during the contract which is pegged at nearly Rs 106 crore.
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