The Delhi High Court has recently stated that it would hear the issue of maintainability of two petitions by the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation and the Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust challenging the cancellation of their Foreign Contribution Regulation Act licenses in July.
Justice Jyoti Singh listed the two pleas for hearing on July 18 after the counsel for the central government raised the maintainability issue.
In October last year, the Union Ministry of Home Affairs canceled the FCRA licenses of the 2 NGOs for alleged violation of laws. The action comes following investigations carried out by an inter-ministerial committee formed by the MHA in 2020.
Earlier, an official said that the FCRA licenses of the Rajiv Gandhi Foundation (RGF) and the Rajiv Gandhi Charitable Trust (RGCT) got canceled after investigations against these NGOs.
The investigations covered alleged manipulation of documents while filing income-tax returns, misuse of funds, and money laundering while receiving funds from foreign countries, including China.
Former Congress president Sonia Gandhi is the chairperson of the RGF as well as the RGCT.
The trustees of the RGF are former prime minister Manmohan Singh, former finance minister P Chidambaram, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Montek Singh Ahluwalia, Suman Dubey, and Ashok Ganguly.
In 1991, the RGF worked on a number of critical issues, including health, science and technology, women and children, and disability support, till 2009. It worked in the education sector, as per its website.
In 2002, the RGCT was established for addressing the development needs of the underprivileged people of the country, especially the rural poor.
Currently, it works in the poorest regions of Uttar Pradesh and Haryana through 2 development initiatives, the Rajiv Gandhi Mahila Vikas Pariyojana (RGMVP) and the Indira Gandhi Eye Hospital and Research Centre (IGEHRC).
