India
The high court also allowed Greenpeace to encash its FDs to run the organisation that is reeling under severe fund shortage due to freezing of its FCRA accounts for six months.
Updated : May 28, 2015, 12:49 PM IST
The Delhi High Court breather given to Greenpeace, particularly with regard to encashing its fixed deposits, has come as a surprise to the Union home ministry which may prompt it to seek further clarification about the amount.
Sources in the Union home ministry said that while auditing Greenpeace accounts, they did not come across these FDs and would like to know the source of it.
Giving interim relief to the Greenpeace, the high court on Thursday allowed the NGO to operate two of its domestic accounts and utilise them to accept fresh domestic donations. The high court also allowed Greenpeace to encash its FDs to run the organisation that is reeling under severe fund shortage due to freezing of its FCRA accounts for six months.
Justice Rajiv Shakdher said the relief is granted so that the NGO can continue to work at the moment while clarifying that it cannot utilise the amount frozen by the government.
Taking note of Greenpeace arguments that the organisation is on the verge of closure due to fund crunch, Justice Shakdher said, "You (Centre) have to release some funds... they need to pay the bills... The way of going forward is that you (Centre) release some funds."
The court also clarified that the Greenpeace will not disturb the balance amount which they were maintaining when their accounts were freezed by the government. It also directed the ministry to decide within eight week the NGO’s plea n under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Rules (FCRR) which says that up to 25 per cent of the total amount in the freezed FCR Act account can be used with government approval.
The court was hearing a plea of Greenpeace India to de-freeze its international and national bank accounts, which were blocked following a home ministry directive last month.
The home ministry, sources said, is not satisfied with NGOs claim that 340 people are employed with it currently.
We are yet to receive the list of 340 employees from Greenpeace that we had asked for a month ago. As per our information there are not more than 60 to 70 employees attached to the NGO at present,” said home ministry sources.