By V K Saxena

The action of the Government of India in cancelling licenses of 9000 NGOs that have been violating FCRA is an act of judicious law enforcement. And suspending FCRA permission of Green Peace and putting Ford Foundation on the watch list is an act of safeguarding the political and socio-economic sovereignty of the nation. It is disappointing that world powers like USA and Germany are voicing concern on this matter, thereby interfering in the internal matters of our Republic. It should not be conceivable by any stretch of imagination that India would allow foreign influences to ride on the back of NGOs to enter our sovereign space and begin eroding us from within, colluding with internal betrayer individuals and organizations. Our nation has to march ahead and not fall behind.

The very countries that have voiced against India’s action on NGOs have very stringent view on NGO activities in their own country. For example, it is not possible in the USA for either a local NGO or a multi-national NGO to engage itself in political activism or polarized political support. And any violation of financial rule would be heavily dealt with and people sent to jail for inordinately long years. For example Gulam Nambi Fai, founder of “Kashmir American Council” (KAC) , an NGO, was arrested by the FBI from Virginia, Washington DC and later sentenced for 4 years Jail by a US Court in 2012 on the charges of receiving money from Pakistan and its spy agency ISI to influence American policy on Kashmir. Political activism by foreign NGOs is perceived in the USA and Germany as acts of war against the nation, while financial irregularities would be dealt as money laundering for dubious purposes.

But when it comes to India, thanks to the inaction and spineless silence portrayed for years by the previous Govt, foreign NGOs such as Ford Foundation were accorded respect similar to what the diplomatic missions command. And it has been proven over and over again that these NGOs had their political masters in the countries of their origin, who had strong interest in influencing the political process and impeding the national development of India. Colluding with them, their Indian partners have worked as termites, wrecking India from within. We all know that foreign funds are always attached with hidden condition.

It is time that this anomaly is set right once and for all. It is time that a self respecting India stands tall against these medieval machinations. It is time that we as Indians feel proud that at last, we have a leader and a Government that is immensely patriotic and is dedicated to the integrity and development of the nation.

(Author is President of National Council for Civil Liberties, Ahmedabad)