oppn parties FCRA Rejection For Missionaries Of Charity

News Snippets

  • SP drops two candidates owing allegiance to Azam Khan from Rampur and Moradabad
  • In Assam, a controversy erupted after a picture of UPPL leader Benjamin Basumatary, lying on a stack of Rs 500 notes circulated on social media. UPPL is an ally of the BJP
  • AAP's Jalandhar-West MP Sushil Kumar Rinku joins the BJP. He was the only AAP Lok Sabha MP
  • Supreme Court dismisses Centre's plea to review its 2023 verdict in the PMLA case
  • Close save for passengers as they remain unhurt after the wings of two planes graze at Kolkata airport. Pilots derostered and inquiry ordered by DGCA
  • Bengal BJP leader Dilip Ghosh gets notice from the EC as well as the BJP for making ugly remarks about Mamata Banerjee's parentage
  • Sadanand Vasanth Date, who faught terrorists in the 26/11 attack and was awarded the Preisent's Police medal, has been appointed the head of the NIA
  • Centre will borrow Rs 7.5L cr in the first six months of FY25, nearly 50% of the target for the full year
  • 25 stocks, including SBI, will see same day trade settlements from today in the world's fastest settlement mode in both BSE and NSE
  • Stocks recover smartly on Wednesday: Sensex rises 526 points to 72996 and Nifty 118 points to 22123
  • Tennis: Rohan Bopanna-Matthew Ebden reached the semifinals of the Miami Open
  • IPL: records tumble as SRH beat MI in a high-scoring match. SRH score 277/3 with 18 sixes and Mumbai score 246 with 20 sixes to fall short by 31 runs. Atotal of 38 sixes, highest in an IPL match were hit and both teams combined to score 523 runs, the highest aggregate in an IPL match
  • Amul will launch fresh milk in the US
  • IPL: RCB beat Punjab by 4 wickets as Kohli and Karthik shine with the bat
  • India strongly objected to German foreign office remarks over the arrest of delhi CM Arvind Kejriwal, called it "biased assumptions"
Delhi Lt Governor Vinai Kumar Saxena says government cannot be run from jail, hints at President's Rule in the capital ////// In a dangerous incident, the wings of two planes grazed while taxiing on the runway at Kolkata airport, all passengers were safe but DGCA ordered an inquiry and the pilots were derostered
oppn parties
FCRA Rejection For Missionaries Of Charity

By Sunil Garodia
First publised on 2021-12-28 05:35:39

About the Author

Sunil Garodia Editor-in-Chief of indiacommentary.com. Current Affairs analyst and political commentator.

On the face of it, the rejection of the FCRA renewal application of Missionaries of Charity for certain irregularities should not have raised such controversy as all entities are expected to completely adhere to the laws in force and the government is fully within its rights to reject any application if it finds that it does not comply with the law.

But as the NDA government has been tightening the screws on foreign funding of NGOs with a particular bias, the action, especially as it was announced on Christmas day, has attracted criticism. Further, since the Missionaries of Charity was started by Nobel laureate Mother Teresa and attracts huge foreign funding from all over the world, there will be international ramifications.

Also, the organization runs more than 240 homes in India. These homes provide care for the sick, the elderly, the orphans and the homeless. It had also provided exemplary service during the lockdowns. It also has more than 5000 nuns serving the community. If funds are blocked - and it runs mainly on foreign funding - these activities will come to a halt and within a short period, it will not be able to provide food to the residents, let alone take their care.

The NDA government has alleged that NGOs receive foreign funding and then use the funds to carry out nefarious activities like religious conversions or even use those funds for terrorist activities. Hence, it has been making FCRA rules stricter. There is nothing wrong with that. Charities must always use the funds received for the purpose which they are donated. But targeting minority-run NGOs, especially the ones that are doing exemplary social service for the last so many years is wrong. Instead of rejecting the application of Missionaries of Charity, the government could have put it on hold and asked for clarifications. It could have passed it on receiving satisfactory answers. 

Latest update: The Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) has clarified and the Missionaries of Charity have also issued a press release stating that their bank accounts were not frozen by the government. MHA has also stated that the organization has not asked for a review of the rejection neither has it applied afresh.