NEW DELHI:The Union Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) on Friday defended before the Delhi High Court its decision to cancel the Foreign Contribution Registration Act (FCRA) licence of Greenpeace India, saying the NGO had violated the norms by opening five accounts to utilise foreign donations without informing the relevant authorities.
The MHA, in an affidavit before Justice V P Vaish, charged Greenpeace with violating the FCRA licence rules by merging its foreign donations with domestic contributions. The court has fixed the matter for further hearing on September 17.
Holding that Greenpeace have not come before the court with clean hands, the MHA said they “continued to use their FCRA accounts despite suspension of the same on April 9”.
“It is submitted that sufficient materials are there to prove that Greenpeace violated various sections of the FCRA 2010, which are also mentioned in the suspension order for 180 days of April 9,” it said.
“The suspension order mentioned the acts and omissions on the part of Greenpeace regarding violations of provisions of the FCRA 2010 and Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Rules, 2011, and a reasonable opportunity was also given to them,” the MHA said in their affidavit.
The affidavit has been filed in a plea moved by the NGO, challenging suspension of its FCRA registration and freezing of its foreign and domestic contribution accounts.