Yesterday morning, the CBI raided premises connected with the social activist Teesta Setalvad, triggering protests from her and her well wishers on the social media. Setalvad described the raids as nothing but a BJP Vendetta.
The raid was based on a case registered last week against Ms Setalvad and her organization for alleged violation of Foreign Contribution Regulation Act in receiving funds from abroad without taking prior permission from the Home Ministry.
The fate of Setalvad, who took on the Modi Government in Gujarat over the 2002 riots in a variety of forums, ranging from the media, to the court room was all but sealed when the Modi Govt. took over at the Centre in the summer of 2014.
Setalvad, who was a thorn in the BJP’s flesh for more than a decade since the Gujarat riots is now set to be extricated surgically, after several unsuccessful but ongoing attempts to do so by the state government since 2006. Willing or compelled, central agencies have now been roped in to deal the knockout blow. While a number of cases have been foisted upon her since 2006, the one that has hit the headlines and continues to do so, is the one against Sabrang communications, Sabrang Trust and Citizens for Justice and peace, a company, a trust and an NGO in which she has an interest.
Sources indicate that the Central Bureau of Investigation has filed an FIR against Setalvad under Sections 120b read with Sections 35, 37 of IPC and Section 3, 11 and 19 of the FCRA Act of 2010 (criminal conspiracy and receiving funds illegally) after notices were issued to her and her husband and which were responded to with voluminous documentation. In the First Information Report FIR, the agency has also named Ms Setalvad's husband Javed Anand and Gulam Mohammed Peshimam, both directors in Sabrang Communications and Publishing based in Santacruz, Mumbai.
The Case
Sabrang Communications was set up in 1993 and began publishing the journal ‘Communalism Combat’. It was Sabrang Communications that published the controversial Justice Srikrishna Commission Report into the Mumbai communal riots of 1992-'93, soon after Jyoti Punwani and Vijendra, printed 500 copies of it even before the state government made it public and provided the public with a glimpse of how public administration works when a riot takes place. Were the riots compounded, contained or constrained is a question that the report tried to answer.
Setalvad and her husband Anand set up the Sabrang Trust in 1995 and did amazing work, winning several awards during the period up until the Gujarat Riots in 2002, and incidentally nobody questioned their work.
They established Citizens for Justice and Peace in 2002 after the riots and went after the alleged perpetrators of the Gujarat violence, pursuing them through various courts. They hired lawyers, identified witnesses, helped record their statements and worked tirelessly for the cause of the victims of the riots and justice. The 120 or so convictions in this sorry episode in Indian history cannot all be attributed to them, but certainly their efforts had a large role to play in a number of convictions.
The raid was based on a case registered last week against Ms Setalvad and her organization for alleged violation of Foreign Contribution Regulation Act in receiving funds from abroad without taking prior permission from the Home Ministry.
The fate of Setalvad, who took on the Modi Government in Gujarat over the 2002 riots in a variety of forums, ranging from the media, to the court room was all but sealed when the Modi Govt. took over at the Centre in the summer of 2014.
Setalvad, who was a thorn in the BJP’s flesh for more than a decade since the Gujarat riots is now set to be extricated surgically, after several unsuccessful but ongoing attempts to do so by the state government since 2006. Willing or compelled, central agencies have now been roped in to deal the knockout blow. While a number of cases have been foisted upon her since 2006, the one that has hit the headlines and continues to do so, is the one against Sabrang communications, Sabrang Trust and Citizens for Justice and peace, a company, a trust and an NGO in which she has an interest.
Sources indicate that the Central Bureau of Investigation has filed an FIR against Setalvad under Sections 120b read with Sections 35, 37 of IPC and Section 3, 11 and 19 of the FCRA Act of 2010 (criminal conspiracy and receiving funds illegally) after notices were issued to her and her husband and which were responded to with voluminous documentation. In the First Information Report FIR, the agency has also named Ms Setalvad's husband Javed Anand and Gulam Mohammed Peshimam, both directors in Sabrang Communications and Publishing based in Santacruz, Mumbai.
The Case
Sabrang Communications was set up in 1993 and began publishing the journal ‘Communalism Combat’. It was Sabrang Communications that published the controversial Justice Srikrishna Commission Report into the Mumbai communal riots of 1992-'93, soon after Jyoti Punwani and Vijendra, printed 500 copies of it even before the state government made it public and provided the public with a glimpse of how public administration works when a riot takes place. Were the riots compounded, contained or constrained is a question that the report tried to answer.
Setalvad and her husband Anand set up the Sabrang Trust in 1995 and did amazing work, winning several awards during the period up until the Gujarat Riots in 2002, and incidentally nobody questioned their work.
They established Citizens for Justice and Peace in 2002 after the riots and went after the alleged perpetrators of the Gujarat violence, pursuing them through various courts. They hired lawyers, identified witnesses, helped record their statements and worked tirelessly for the cause of the victims of the riots and justice. The 120 or so convictions in this sorry episode in Indian history cannot all be attributed to them, but certainly their efforts had a large role to play in a number of convictions.
Even as they became a thorn in the flesh of the Modi government in Gujarat, pushing victim’s cases, and pursuing the alleged perpetrators, both in the courts and on television, their work was not overtly hampered, for fear of a national media backlash, until they went after the then Chief minister of Gujarat, and current prime minister Narendra Modi in the case of the death by rioting of Javed Jafri. They supported the widow of the Congress MP, Ehsan Jafri, in her pursuit of the alleged perpetrators of the crime.
The NGO, set up by Teesta Setalvad, ‘Citizens for Justice and Peace’, helped Zakia Jafri file a criminal complaint for criminal and administrative culpability against top politicians and policemen, including the then chief minister, Narendra Modi. The Supreme Court set up a Special Investigation team (SIT) to go into the charges of criminal conspiracy, but their report stated that there was not enough evidence to prove his involvement. Hence the ‘clean chit’. Jafri, aided by Setalvad, protested in the trial court in December 2013, but her petition was rejected. They filed a revision petition in March 2014 and this will now be heard on July 27th instant.
Interestingly, within eight days of the petition being rejected an FIR was filed against Setalvad and others for embezzlement of funds collected for the Gulbarg Society. All the organization’s accounts and Setalvad’s personal accounts were frozen soon thereafter.
The Gujarat Crime Branch which till date, had handled all the cases related to Setalvad, was by now comfortable in the knowledge that the Centre would be a willing ally in their efforts to shut down Setalvad’s activities. They wrote to the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in Delhi in March 2015, raising objections to Setalvad’s organizations receiving funds from the Ford Foundation. With surprising alacrity, the ministry sent notices to them about violating provisions of the Foreign Contributions Regulations Act. While Setalvad’s NGO was not the exception to this FCRA query, as things turned out, they were certainly, along with Greenpeace, a prime target. The Ford Foundation, despite the Obama Modi bonhomie, was caught in the cross fire and like any other Foreign contributor, is now required to get clearance from the Home Ministry, before releasing funds to any non-governmental organization.
The Ministry of Home Affairs raised three questions – one of eligibility to receive foreign contributions, the second of record keeping, and the third, lobbying with political parties the government accused Sabrang communications of accepting $421,000 from Ford Foundation in violation of FCRA and without getting prior approval from the union home ministry.
Sabrang in its defense says that under section 4 of the FCRA 2010 they are entitled and they convinced themselves of this legality after consulting experts and before signing a Consultancy Agreement with Ford Foundation in 2004 and 2006 "to address the issues of caste and communalism" through a clearly defined set of activities. In their response to the MHA in respect of the second query, Sabrang reiterated that they had kept records and had provided copies of the same to the FCRA team, during the inspection visit of the team in Mumbai on June 9 and 10, 2015, and additional documents as required were also posted to the FCRA department. As regards the third accusation, the Setalvad team says that they are not lobbying, but as an NGO they engage with the government of the day to draw their attention towards the legitimate social issues.
According to them, the organizations in the dock, sent in nearly 25000 pages of documents to support their responses, yet the CBI filed an FIR against Setalvad and raided her residence. The next objective seems to be custody, which the Supreme Court has been preventing through repeated injunctions based on pleas from the Setalvad couple.
As of now, all Setalvad can do is defend herself against the series of FIR’s and warrants, thereby slowing down her pro bono legal work through her trusts, if not stifling it all together, which the government appears determined to do. She has to commute from Mumbai where she lives and works to Ahmadabad and Delhi, from one court to another to sustain her freedom and work – just as the Doctor in Delhi ordered.
Throttling dissent and vilifying opponents
While Setalvad’s NGO is not the only one in the eye of the NGO squeeze, and therefore cannot prima facie be seen as the target of the pogrom – Greenpeace is one other prominent one among them – it certainly is a reminder of the power of the state to crush its opponents, - and opponents of the state they are, but in the interest of civil liberties - through instruments of state oppression, legally, and ruthlessly.
While the government says, and rightfully so, that they are merely ensuring the rule of law and due process, to the discerning lay observer that has voted this government to power for development, it would appear that the state is using the innumerable instruments at its disposal to intimidate and throttle dissent, and ultimately buy silence and compliance. Examples abound from the Setalvad case to the Khemka and Amitabh Thakur case, and even the killing of a number of RTI activists in the recent past. Dissent in the social media too, has been viewed with a jaudiced eye. This is not healthy for a vibrant democracy that should welcome dissent.
The actions of the government in the Malegon blast case, where a public prosecutor, by her own admission to the media, was directed to go slow, are in direct contrast to the alacrity displayed in the Teesta Case and the way other sensitive cases like the Ajmer Blast case are being handled.
Communal conflagrations of the magnitude of the Mumbai, Delhi and Gujarat riots are a thing of the past, and the government claims credit for this development, but they, perhaps deliberately, do not acknowledge, that the nature of the beast has changed. Conflagrations’ are localized and low key, but are a constant, and peak just before state elections. Minorities have begun to feel insecure, and are retiring to their corners, hoping to be ignored, but that is not going to happen very easily.
Viewed against this backdrop, silence of the leadership in government cannot mean anything else other than complicity.
The NGO, set up by Teesta Setalvad, ‘Citizens for Justice and Peace’, helped Zakia Jafri file a criminal complaint for criminal and administrative culpability against top politicians and policemen, including the then chief minister, Narendra Modi. The Supreme Court set up a Special Investigation team (SIT) to go into the charges of criminal conspiracy, but their report stated that there was not enough evidence to prove his involvement. Hence the ‘clean chit’. Jafri, aided by Setalvad, protested in the trial court in December 2013, but her petition was rejected. They filed a revision petition in March 2014 and this will now be heard on July 27th instant.
Interestingly, within eight days of the petition being rejected an FIR was filed against Setalvad and others for embezzlement of funds collected for the Gulbarg Society. All the organization’s accounts and Setalvad’s personal accounts were frozen soon thereafter.
The Gujarat Crime Branch which till date, had handled all the cases related to Setalvad, was by now comfortable in the knowledge that the Centre would be a willing ally in their efforts to shut down Setalvad’s activities. They wrote to the Ministry of Home Affairs (MHA) in Delhi in March 2015, raising objections to Setalvad’s organizations receiving funds from the Ford Foundation. With surprising alacrity, the ministry sent notices to them about violating provisions of the Foreign Contributions Regulations Act. While Setalvad’s NGO was not the exception to this FCRA query, as things turned out, they were certainly, along with Greenpeace, a prime target. The Ford Foundation, despite the Obama Modi bonhomie, was caught in the cross fire and like any other Foreign contributor, is now required to get clearance from the Home Ministry, before releasing funds to any non-governmental organization.
The Ministry of Home Affairs raised three questions – one of eligibility to receive foreign contributions, the second of record keeping, and the third, lobbying with political parties the government accused Sabrang communications of accepting $421,000 from Ford Foundation in violation of FCRA and without getting prior approval from the union home ministry.
Sabrang in its defense says that under section 4 of the FCRA 2010 they are entitled and they convinced themselves of this legality after consulting experts and before signing a Consultancy Agreement with Ford Foundation in 2004 and 2006 "to address the issues of caste and communalism" through a clearly defined set of activities. In their response to the MHA in respect of the second query, Sabrang reiterated that they had kept records and had provided copies of the same to the FCRA team, during the inspection visit of the team in Mumbai on June 9 and 10, 2015, and additional documents as required were also posted to the FCRA department. As regards the third accusation, the Setalvad team says that they are not lobbying, but as an NGO they engage with the government of the day to draw their attention towards the legitimate social issues.
According to them, the organizations in the dock, sent in nearly 25000 pages of documents to support their responses, yet the CBI filed an FIR against Setalvad and raided her residence. The next objective seems to be custody, which the Supreme Court has been preventing through repeated injunctions based on pleas from the Setalvad couple.
As of now, all Setalvad can do is defend herself against the series of FIR’s and warrants, thereby slowing down her pro bono legal work through her trusts, if not stifling it all together, which the government appears determined to do. She has to commute from Mumbai where she lives and works to Ahmadabad and Delhi, from one court to another to sustain her freedom and work – just as the Doctor in Delhi ordered.
Throttling dissent and vilifying opponents
While Setalvad’s NGO is not the only one in the eye of the NGO squeeze, and therefore cannot prima facie be seen as the target of the pogrom – Greenpeace is one other prominent one among them – it certainly is a reminder of the power of the state to crush its opponents, - and opponents of the state they are, but in the interest of civil liberties - through instruments of state oppression, legally, and ruthlessly.
While the government says, and rightfully so, that they are merely ensuring the rule of law and due process, to the discerning lay observer that has voted this government to power for development, it would appear that the state is using the innumerable instruments at its disposal to intimidate and throttle dissent, and ultimately buy silence and compliance. Examples abound from the Setalvad case to the Khemka and Amitabh Thakur case, and even the killing of a number of RTI activists in the recent past. Dissent in the social media too, has been viewed with a jaudiced eye. This is not healthy for a vibrant democracy that should welcome dissent.
The actions of the government in the Malegon blast case, where a public prosecutor, by her own admission to the media, was directed to go slow, are in direct contrast to the alacrity displayed in the Teesta Case and the way other sensitive cases like the Ajmer Blast case are being handled.
Communal conflagrations of the magnitude of the Mumbai, Delhi and Gujarat riots are a thing of the past, and the government claims credit for this development, but they, perhaps deliberately, do not acknowledge, that the nature of the beast has changed. Conflagrations’ are localized and low key, but are a constant, and peak just before state elections. Minorities have begun to feel insecure, and are retiring to their corners, hoping to be ignored, but that is not going to happen very easily.
Viewed against this backdrop, silence of the leadership in government cannot mean anything else other than complicity.
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