NEW DELHI, Dec 13: The Centre cancelled the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act (FCRA) registration of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation (RGF) as it allegedly received ₹ 1.35 crore from the Chinese Embassy, the union home minister Amit Shah said on Tuesday.
Addressing reporters outside Parliament House, Mr Shah also claimed that the Foundation headed by Congress leader Sonia Gandhi received ₹ 50 lakh from Zakir Naik, founder of the Islamic Research Foundation (IRF), which was banned by the government for its alleged involvement in terrorism.
On the border issue, the minister made it clear that the “BJP government will not allow any incursion on land. We will not leave an inch of land. The bravery shown by soldiers is appreciable, they have saved our land.” Mr Shah alleged that the Lok Sabha proceedings were disrupted by the Congress citing clashes on the border, but the actual reason was that it did not want to hear facts about the RGF as a question was listed about it during the Question Hour in the House.
“Between 2005 and 2007, the RGF had received ₹ 1.35 crore from the Chinese embassy. After following due diligence, the home ministry cancelled the FCRA registration of the RGF,” he said. According to law, any NGO which intends to receive foreign funding must register itself under the FCRA.
Amit Shah alleged that while the Congress claimed that the money from the embassy was meant to undertake research on ties between India and China, the country wanted to know if the research covered the issue of land that India lost during the 1962 war. Recalling that China had raised questions about then Prime Minister Manmohan Singh’s visit to Arunachal Pradesh on October 13, 2009, he asked if the party carried out research on the issue.
The minister asked whether the party also researched issues like incursion of thousands of hectares of land by China, Jawaharlal Nehru “sacrificing” India’s seat in the United Nations Security Council, denial of visa by China to the then Chief Minister of Arunachal Pradesh Dorjee Khandu and issuing of staple visa to residents of Jammu and Kashmir.
Mr Shah also alleged that when the Indian soldiers were fighting the Chinese PLA at Galwan, someone from the Congress was throwing a dinner for an official of the Chinese embassy and asked why work on vital infrastructure projects was stalled in 2012 following a threat from China.
The FCRA registration of the RGF and Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust (RGCT) were cancelled in October last year after an investigation carried out by an inter-ministerial committee formed by the home ministry in 2020.
The trustees of the RGF are former Prime Minister Manmohan Singh and Congress leaders P Chidambaram, Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Suman Dubey, and Ashok Ganguly. The trustees of the RGCT are Rahul Gandhi, Ashok Ganguly, Bansi Mehta, and Deep Joshi.
Set up in 1991, the RGF worked on a number of critical issues, including health, science and technology, women and children, and disability support, till 2009. It also worked in the education sector, according to its website. The RGCT was established in 2002 to address the development needs of the underprivileged people, especially the rural poor.
(Manas Dasgupta)
