Before discussing Amnesty India or its “activities” carried out on our soil, you should understand few important terms and procedures. An NGO does not carry out “profit making” (at least on paper) activities therefore are dependent on “Contributions/donations” to run their operations. In order to receive contribution in any kind or currency from foreign sources an NGO needs the approval from Indian government which is called “prior permission” or they have to register under Foreign Contribution Regulation Act and follow all laid down procedures.
In this post an attempt is being made to understand how NGO’s are using foreign funds to shape public opinions and even our policies via Court cases vis a vis the Amnesty case. So why is this important? Our forefathers fought for independence from “foreign rule” so that we ourselves should decide the destiny and also to bring all the princely states together to form Bharat.
We will come to this again. Now to Amnesty
Amnesty has 2 registered entities in India. Here is the snapshot of the data from Ministry of Corporate Affairs.
It is pertinent to note that one entity of Amnesty is a “for profit” which they proudly display as “tax paying entity” on their website and other is a non-profit entity registered under Section 8 of the Companies Act, 2013. The last column is what interests me. So I decided to dig deep and here is what I could gather.
A study of some Congressional records of the United States Government which can be accessed Here and especially records from as early as 1991 show that US government was actively lobbying for allowing entry of Amnesty International in India. So why would the US Government want an entry for an NGO in India? It only shows how Amnesty is connected in the highest echelons of US Govt. Most probably because of this it wasn’t allowed to set afoot until in 2012 under the UPA government Amnesty was allowed an entry into India. However the good part is Ministry of Home Affairs website Amnesty India is not shown as a registered NGO for acceptance of foreign funds so they fall under the “prior approval category” to accept foreign funds.
What’s the Issue when all Members of Amnesty India are “Indians”?
It is true to say that people who run Amnesty India are indeed “Indians” i.e. they hold passports just like you or I but when it comes to laws there is a concept of “conflict of interest” and in case of Amnesty it should be deeply looked into as they claim to be “independent” from governmental influence. In earlier paragraph have highlighted the high interest of US Govt to lobby for Amnesty now will state some peculiar relations between people who manage Amnesty India operations:
- Minar Pimple is mentioned as the Senior Director of Global Operations, Amnesty International (AI) on AI’s website. As per MCA Minar Pimple was a Director of Oxfam India as well. Oxfam India has in the past “worked” on Right To Education etc. Oxfam India is funded by Oxfam UK which is funded by UK Governments DFID.
- Divya Iyer, now Research Manager at Amnesty International, India was with NDTV, Aaj Tak and CNN-IBN. I remember reading one of her articles where she mentioned that Yakub Memon should not be hanged.
- Anantapadmanabhan Executive Director at Amnesty International India, was formerly Executive Director, Greenpeace India.
- Salil Shetty was CEO of ActionAid. Harsh Mander “a very close” lieutenant of Sonia Gandhi had once been the head of ActionAid.
The question is how can an entity claim to be “independent” when its funding sources and/or its people are somewhere or the other connected to foreign governments? This is deeply disturbing. When we as Indians demand some particular laws it is based on our own experiences however the same cannot be said for people who’s bosses have links with CIA funded ford foundation, foreign governments and even evangelical organisations. (a book claims Amnesty is funded by UK Intelligence Agencies)
Sometime back a “prior permission” to accept foreign funds by Amnesty India was rejected as about 1,00,000 pounds was to be received through a Gibraltar (tax haven) based Trust named “Kusuma Trust”, who’s Founder once was caught in the USA for fraud. Why shouldn’t these trusts be probed? How come dubious links arise from time and again?
Specifically upon accessing the records of Amnesty International India Private Limited few facts emerged:
- 1,00,00,000 “zero interest unsecured” compulsorily convertible debentures of face value INR 10/- were allotted to M/s Amnesty International Ltd. Vide resolution Dt. 30th June, 2015.
- Amnesty India obtained a Commercial loan of INR 11,40,00,000/- from Kotak Mahindra Bank.
This is pretty huge loan for an entity formed in 2013. I highlight further details Here
What is pertinent to note that Amnesty International India Private Limited has its main objects as:
“To provide research, strategic as well as operational consultancy and implementation as well as related on-going support services to clients in India and abroad relating to development, promotion and fostering of human rights and social sector issues by implementing campaigns, promotion programmes, undertake research studies and publish reports relating to human rights or other areas of interest in the social sector and conducting feasibility, scoping and detailed analytic studies based on primary and secondary research and delivering detailed reports based on data and facts developed from such research.
So was the programme In Bengaluru arranged to further this objective? Time and again many people have accused Amnesty India of not speaking about Pakistan atrocities in Balochistan, deaths of Indian army personnel in Kashmir valley etc. As per few news reports their 2015 Human rights report on AFSPA is one of the reasons why MHA is not registering them under FCRA.
It is pertinent to note that the programme was arranged by Amnesty India which they don’t deny, what they deny is that their personnel did not raise “azaadi” slogans. An organisation which is funded by foreign organisations/governments which is managed by people who directly or indirectly have links with other foreign organisations arranges an event just around our Independence Day where azaadi slogans are shouted. What was the need for such an event? There is a concept of “reasonability” which in my opinion the organisers ought to have factored in. NGOs demand “actions” citing “human rights” and work actively to shape our policies. They fight Court cases to “fight for child rights” “organise events to evoke public response”. All of the above clearly points to an“invisible hand” which is behind their actions.
By allowing such NGO’s to function in India, aren’t we allowing them to do exactly the same stuff from which we sought azaadi from the Britisher’s? Our forefathers fought hard to give “us” the right to decide our future and fought foreign forces to form the “Union of India” and we should let these foreign funded NGO’s openly say “Kashmir ki Azaadi” as “Freedom of Speech?”
I hope we scrap the FCRA and/or closely monitor activities of these NGOs. Evil designs shall not and should not be tolerated. Meanwhile Amnesty (as per news reports) is under a strict probe for “possible” FCRA violations by the MHA. This is a welcome move.