Senior lawyer and former additional solicitor-general Indira Jaising’s NGO, Lawyers Collective, is still under fire from the government with the Union home ministry giving it 10 days to respond to a q
Senior lawyer and former additional solicitor-general Indira Jaising’s NGO, Lawyers Collective, is still under fire from the government with the Union home ministry giving it 10 days to respond to a questionnaire sent to it last month seeking details of its bank accounts and amount of foreign contributions received and utilised since its inception. While the NGO has trashed all reports of any alleged FCRA violations, the MHA is now waiting for the formal response to take any further decision on the matter.
“Initially, the NGO was given a month’s time to reply which was extended by 15 days. Now we have given them an additional 10 days to reply to the questionnaire and we hope the response will come,” said a senior government official on Monday.
Ministry sources said a standard questionnaire is sent to NGOs against whom they receive any complaints or any report is generated by the intelligence agencies of their alleged FCRA violations. The response to the questionnaire is then pitted against the complaints to allay concerns and if the replies are found to be sufficient and are able to dismiss concerns, the MHA can decide to let the NGO off the hook, a top official said.
When the MHA sent a notice to the NGO, Ms Jaising had said, “I am indeed surprised that the notice seems to have been released to the press, even before it is served on Lawyers Collective or me or before I or the Lawyers Collective have had an opportunity to respond to it. I am constrained to come to the conclusion that this is an exercise in creating a negative public perception about me and the Lawyers Collective and not about the alleged violations of law.” In her statement, she had expressed hope that the government will follow the legal route, rather than use the press to “achieve extraneous aims”.
