Action plan against NGOs

BRP Bhaskar
Gulf Today

Close on the heels of Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s open exhortation to the Judiciary to guard against “five-star activists”, the government last week launched a direct attack on Greenpeace, the global non-government organisation whose Indian chapter is spearheading the people’s campaign against some of his pet projects which endangers life and livelihood of the poor.

Modi delivered his warning against activists at a conference of Chief Justices and Chief Ministers, a periodical exercise aimed at sorting out matters of mutual concern to the Judiciary and the Executive.

The Judiciary, he said, should be cautious about delivering perception-driven verdicts, especially when perceptions were sourced from five-star activists.

Indira Jaising, a former Additional Solicitor-General, in a forthright response, said Modi seemed to be targeting his opponents and those critical of the development policies of the ruling dispensation. “The message for the Judiciary,” she added, “is: ‘Don’t mess with me or my development policies.’”

The attempt to intimidate the Judiciary into taking an anti-activist line came a few weeks after the Delhi High Court quashed a government order which prevented Greenpeace campaigner Priya S Pillai from boarding a flight to London. Her mission was to draw the attention of British parliamentarians to a mega project of a UK-based company which threatens to destroy the environment and uproot tribes in a forest area.

Last week the government launched a fresh attack on Greenpeace. This time it sought not to restrain an individual activist but to immobilise the entire organisation. It suspended Greenpeace India’s licence to receive remittances from abroad for six months and blocked its bank accounts.

Some of the government’s allegations against Greenpeace were couched in vague terms. For instance, it accused the NGO of campaigning, protesting and lobbying against the government policies and attempting to delay and obstruct energy plans. One charge was downright frivolous: it accused the NGO of holding talks with the Aam Admi Party, the ruling party of Delhi state. Another was hilarious: it said the NGO had placed a full-page anti-nuclear colour advertisement with a sarcasm-laden header in a leading English daily.

Greenpeace India accused the government of conducting a smear campaign against it and vowed to continue campaigning on issues fearlessly. It also said it would challenge the government order in court.

Following a Supreme Court directive, the Central Bureau of Investigation wrote to all state governments in 2013 seeking information on non-government organisations registered with them. Not all of them replied.

Based on the replies received the CBI estimated that there were about two million NGOs in the country. Uttar Pradesh topped the list with more than half a million and Kerala came next with about 369,000. Most of them are actually voluntary organisations engaged in social work with grants from the government and meekly toe the official line.

Unlike them, the Indian chapter of Greenpeace, formed in 2001, is an advocacy group which seeks changes in policies detrimental to the interests of the people, especially the poor, and provides constructive leadership to grassroots-level campaigns against disastrous policies pursued by the government. Since 2010, it has been promoting sustainable agricultural projects and solar-based energy models.

Former Delhi University professor Achin Vinaik, prominent environmentalist Ashish Kothari, leading lawyer Vrinda Grover and G. Gautama of the Chennai-based Krishnamurthi Foundation are among the members of Greenpeace India’s executive committee.

Greenpeace India receives funds from abroad but local donations finance most of its activities. It spent about Rs335 million in 2013. Of this, Rs200 million came from local donations. Foreign grants amounted to Rs132 million. Greenpeace accepts donations only from individuals and foundations. It does not accept donations from governments and corporate entities.

The hunt is unlikely to stop with Greenpeace. Home Ministry officials were ready with an action plan against a whole range of NGOs even before Modi took office. The day before he took oath as Prime Minister, a Delhi newspaper reported that good days may be over for NGOs operating in sectors like participatory democracy, advocacy, action research, innovative communication, inclusiveness etc.

It quoted sources as saying the Home Ministry’s Foreigners Division was tightening the noose around NGOs and that those who organised workshops on regulatory frameworks, developing communication strategies, people’s participation, policy analysis etc were being screened. Modi couldn’t have asked for more. --Gulf Today, Sharjah, April 14, 2015.

Falling between two stools

BRP Bhaskar
Gulf Today

The buglers are proclaiming a victory for India at the United Nations Conference on Sustainable Development, held in Rio de Janeiro, last week but non-government organisations campaigning on the issue of sustainable development are unimpressed.

Prime Minister Manmohan Singh flew into Brazil from the G-20 meeting in Mexico where, playing Santa Claus, he had pledged $10 billion towards the $73 billion committed by the BRIC nations to recapitalise the International Monetary Fund to enable it to bail out crisis-hit Europe.

At Rio, he appeared like a mendicant rather than a philanthropist. He complained there was little evidence of industrialised world helping the developing nations to find the resources and technology they need to reduce the intensity of emissions.

The conference, dubbed Rio+20 as it was taking place two decades after the Earth Summit held in that city, brought together leaders from more than 180 countries. India was a key player at the 1992 conference as the chief spokesman of the developing world. A major achievement of that meet was the Climate Change Convention, which led to the Kyoto Protocol.

Rio+20 took place in vastly different circumstances from what prevailed at the time of the first meet. The average annual global temperature was up by 0.32 degree Celsius, global carbon dioxide levels were 10 per cent higher and primary forests had dwindled by 300 million hectares. What is more, the rich nations’ interest in protection of the environment had waned as their economies declined.

India appeared to be not too sure where exactly it stood. As Sejal Worah, World Wildlife Fund’s project director in Delhi, put it, India was straddling both sides — the rich as well as the developing nations. “We have not heard of India being on any side,” she told reporters at Rio. “It is losing its leadership edge. It is always riding on someone else. We don’t stand for anything.”

Environment Minister Jayanthi Natarajan said India was happy that no specific goals and targets had been agreed upon. Environment journalist Daryl D’Monte termed her comment astonishing.

India’s diminished role at Rio II is a reflection of the dichotomy in the government’s approach to developmental problems. Its record in upholding the principles laid down at Rio I is less than satisfactory.

“Human beings are at the centre of concern for human development,” the first Rio declaration had said. “They are entitled to a healthy and productive life in harmony with nature.” An agreement concluded at that time directed governments not to carry out any activities on the lands of indigenous people that would cause environmental degradation or be culturally inappropriate.

Yet all across India the government is endangering the lives and livelihood of the indigenous people, who live in subhuman conditions, by permitting domestic and foreign corporations to grab their lands for industrial projects. In Orissa, for seven years tribesmen have been fighting an unequal battle with the South Korean giant Posco, which wants to set up the world’s largest steel plant in their homeland.

Disappointed with the draft of the declaration prepared for adoption at the summit meeting, Indian NGO representatives gathered at Rio issued an open appeal to Manmohan Singh to display bold leadership and rescue the conference. They asked him to advocate strong fundamental principles for the world and make basic changes in economic and other policies back home.

It turned out to be a cry in the wilderness. “We are reiterating the mistakes of the past while the crisis has worsened,” Ashish Kothari of Pune-based Kalpavriksh said later.

The official claims of victory rest primarily on a few passages in the platitudinous declaration, grandiloquently titled “The Future We Want.” It says all countries, especially the developing nations, need additional resources to ensure sustainable development and unwanted conditionalities on development assistance must be avoided.

The declaration asks all countries to prioritise sustainable development and allocate resources based on national needs. It also talks in vague terms about giving assistance to the developing countries to ensure long-term debt sustainability.

The G-77 countries and China sought $30 billion a year for assisting the developing nations but the document makes no firm financial commitment. Instead, it suggests that additional resources be mobilised on a voluntary basis through innovative financing mechanisms.

In a joint letter to the UN, a group of international civil society organisations said: “The Future We Want is not what resulted from the Rio+20 negotiation process.” -- Gulf Today, Sharjah, June 26, 2012.