Even as the Gujarat government trained guns on Ford Foundation, a US-based NGO, for allegedly funding anti-India activities of social activist Teesta Setalvad, the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) said they were conducting a probe “independently” and will not be necessarily influenced by the state government’s report. A senior government official said they were treading cautiously on the allegations as they did not want a re-run of Greenpeace activist Priya Pillai’s case, where the Delhi High Court pulled up the MHA for opening a look-out circular against her and also ordered to de-freeze their accounts. [related-post] The state government in its report to home secretary LC Goyal had said that the US-based NGO violated Foreign Exchange Management Act and “directly interfered in the internal affairs of the country and is abetting communal disharmony in India”. The Gujarat government said it came across the anomalies while it was investigating the embezzlement of funds by Setalvad’s NGO, Citizens for Justice and Peace and Sabrang Trust. The state government said that it came across Ford Foundations’s role while investigating an alleged fund embezzlement case to the tune of Rs 1.51 crore against Setalvad, based on a complaint by the survivors of Gulberg Society. A team of MHA officials visited Gujarat last week and inspected the records of the two NGOs. In its letter to the MHA, the Gujarat government stated, “It is revealed during the course of investigation (in the riot relief fund embezzlement case) that Ford Foundation, established with the stated goal of promoting communal harmony, democratic principles and social justice, has been indulging in covert activities of promoting interests that are completely contradictory to the said goals.” “We are still corroborating facts and are yet to come to conclusion that Ford Foundation covertly funded anti-India activities. We are in the last leg of investigation and don’t want to jump the gun. We are treading cautiously,” said a senior government official.
