Genuine NGOs struggle with credibility

This particular NGO allegedly spent huge amount of money on setting up a new office and on foreign trips for purposes other than those relating to the project.

In Bikaner, Rajasthan, another NGO involved in women’s welfare reportedly pocketed around Rs two lakh by putting fictitious names on its rolls.

In another case, the CBI found that out of seven NGOs receiving funds to help women in self-employment, four had not done a thing and the rest existed only on paper.

About 400 such NGOs have been blacklisted by the Council for the Advancement of People’s Action and RuralTechnology (CAPART) while the Central Social and Welfare Board (CSWB) has blacklisted 3,000 NGOs.

The CSWB through which government funds NGOs issues about Rs 40 crore every year in addition to thousands of dollars given by institutions like CAPART the NGOs default in fulfilling requirements like submission of audited account and details of programme implementation within a stipulated period of time,” says Smita Nagraj, jt secretary, CSWB.

“Sometimes the blacklisting is forever, while often it is conditional upon their (NGOs) fulfilling certain requirements which vary from case to case,” says Nagraj.

“We don’t fund NGOs as they approach us but rely on the recommendations by the state social welfare boards who are supposed to verify the credentials of NGOs,” she adds.

Even as reports of the money meant for socially useful works being siphoned off by phony NGOs abound, Ajay Sunder, PRO Helpage India says, “I don’t think money meant for good and genuine NGOs is being siphoned off by the bad ones,that is not happening. Genuine and socially committed NGOs have nothing to fear about as their work is before everyone to see.”

According to Sunder, Helpage India, an NGO working for poor and destitute elderly people and funding like-minded NGOs, “Ensures that the funds provided to other organisations are not misappropriated. We do it through a system of checks and balances including account-auditing and frequent interaction.” Environmentalist Iqbal Malik, who runs an NGO Vatavaran says, “The NGOs which are really working at the grassroot level don’t even know how to write a project report necessary to get the money and those who don’t work but know the skill of writing project report, manage to get the money sanctioned.”

She cites an instance where an NGO “converted most of land granted to it to keep stray animals into boutiques, pushing animals into a corner.”

“With the number of phony and fake NGOs going up with increasing reports of their involvement in numerous fraud and embezzlement cases,the popular trust in them is eroding fast,” says Javed Abidi, executive director with the national centre for disabled people.

“People have become quite cynical about the worth and utility of these NGOs,” says Rajesh Tyagi, an activist with the Dilli Janwadi Adhikar Manch.

NGOs have become a money minting machine and being smart in public relations, they are more encouraged by the press who gives them coverage and don’t cover the positive work done by the genuine NGOs as good work is no news to the press”.

According to Tyagi the total number of NGOs in the country is about 70,000, Nagraj feels that while the actual number might be in lakh, the number of the registered NGOs may not be more than 10,000. “Commercialisation of NGOs has no doubt led to their rapid growth but it does not mean that every one joining the field is coming because of money only,” says Abidi.

“A study conducted by us showed a strong correlation between bad NGOs and their crony politicians in power but to make a sweepingremark like `sab chor hai’ (everyone is a thief) could be quite unfair to the genuine NGOs,” says Mathew Cherian, programme officer with Plan International.

Cherian attributes the spurt in NGOs to the “High unemployment and to the fact that setting up an NGO is easier than setting up an industry and one can also do something for the society.”

Indu Prakash, a retired bureaucrat now working for an NGO says, “There are black sheep everywhere and ditto with the NGOs but the number of genuine NGOs are definitely more than those of non-genuine ones”.

A high official with CAPART says that there are more good than the bad NGOs but “unfortunately it is only the bad ones who get projected.”

Singh, who is secretary of voluntary health association says that blacklisting is easy but it is difficult to ensure that the blacklisted ones do not get the funds again. “The government has to be more careful, it should examine the credentials of the NGOs,” suggests Sunder.

Smita Nagraj says,“ We knowthere are NGOs which are there only to make money but as far as possible we try to verify and crosscheck it before we sanction the money.”

The CAPART official says already such mechanism exists as there are about 500 monitors, experts in their fields, with CAPART who do mid-term and final evaluation of the approved projects but the government cannot do much.

Cherian says, “WE have already framed a code of conduct and plan to bring out a list of good NGOs rated and evaluated by a panel of social activists on the basis of their past ten years’ performance.”

“A code of conduct should be evolved to evaluate and rate the NGOs and the initiative should come from within the NGO sector,” he says.

In similar vein, Abidi emphasises the need for evolving a mechanism to rate and evaluate NGOs and to exchange information about NGO activities to check vested interests”.