The National Democratic Alliance (NDA) government has cancelled Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) licences of about ever since it came to power in May 2014.
The home ministry, which took the action, has justified it saying these organisations were technically violating various provisions of the Act.
Cancellation of license would mean that these NGOs are no longer eligible to receive foreign funds. It should be noted that several of these NGOs are involved in rights-based advocacy work, especially working in the domain of human rights.
A plethora of civil society organisations have issued statements against this mass cancellation of FCRA licences stating that this is nothing but an 'abuse of legal procedures'.
They also "unequivocally condemned the present use of the FCRA as a tool of repression by the current government".
Organisations such as Greenpeace India, Amnesty International India, TARSHI Delhi and the Centre for Social Justice were all signatories to this statement.
Even the National Human Rights Commission has issued a notice to the home ministry on the issue.
"Prima facie it appears FCRA licence non-renewal is neither legal nor objective and thereby impinging on the rights of the human rights defenders in access to funding, including foreign funding," the apex human rights watchdog in the country said in the notice.
The FCRA is an intimidating law, especially since the original Act came into force in 1976 during the Emergency by the Indira Gandhi-led government. The Act, at that time, prohibited MPs, electoral candidates, political parties, judges from accepting foreign contributions.
Even "correspondents, columnist, cartoonist, editor, owner, printer or publisher of a registered newspaper" were included in the ambit of the definition of candidate under the Act. The objective was certainly to remove all voices of political dissent, though the ostensible legislative intent suggested that the law was to restrain foreign intervention from internal,
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