Foreign fund row hits TS, AP NGOs

Action taken for not complying with the FCRA Act

The foreign funding of about 1,398 NGOs from Andhra Pradesh and 655 NGOs from TS were cancelled under the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) from 2015 to 2017. In 2017 alone, 454 associations in AP and 190 associations in TS lost their foreign funding. Across the country since 2012, registrations of more than 18,500 NGOs and institutions have been cancelled for violating laws. These include some of the prominent institutions like IGNOU, JNU and IITDelhi, apart from several educational societies, women’s and religious organisations. This cancellation has prevented them from receiving foreign funding.

Union Minister of State for Home, Kiren Rijiju, announced in the Rajya Sabha on Wednesday that action has been taken against the NGOs and institutions for not complying with the various provisions of Section 18(1) of the FCRA, 2010.

Section 18(1) states, “Every person who has been granted a certificate or given prior approval under this Act shall give, within such time and in such manner as may be prescribed, an intimation to the Central government, and such other authority as may be specified by the Central government, as to the amount of each foreign contribution received by it, the source from which and the manner in which such foreign contribution was received, and the purposes for which, and the manner in which such foreign contribution was utilised by him.”

In a written reply to a question posed by MP K.C. Ramamurthy, he said “Registration certificates of the eligible associations, after representing and establishing their claim for being covered under the Central government’s Gazette Order S.O.No.1492(E) dated July 1 , 2011, have been restored.”

A list of the cancelled associations is available on the web-portal www.fcraonline.nic.in of the ministry of home affairs.

Since 2012, 854 registrations have been cancelled in Telangana as per the data on the website. These include actor-producer Akkineni Nagarjuna’s Akkineni International Foundation, Birla Archeological Cultural Research Institute among others.

Since 2012, 1,858 registrations have been cancelled in Andhra Pradesh as per the website. Some of these include the Anantapur Medical College Trust, Nirmala Convent, Santhiniketan Educational Society, Sri Venkateswara Institute of Medical Sciences, Vignana Jyothi Educational Society, National Residential Educational Society among others.