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| Govt. clears proposed law on foreign funding | | |
New Delhi, Nov. 9
The government today cleared a proposed law to bar several organisations, including those of a political nature and electronic media houses, and journalists from receiving foreign funding.
The new legislation, titled the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Bill of 2006, was cleared by the Union Cabinet at a meeting chaired by Prime Minister Manmohan Singh. It will be introduced in Parliament's forthcoming winter session.
The proposed bill also provides for repeal of the 30-year -old Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act of 1976 to give more teeth to enforcement agencies to regulate donations from abroad.
The proposed bill's "preamble has been reworded to prohibit acceptance and utilisation of foreign contribution or foreign hospitality for any activities detrimental to the national interests".
The additional types of groups or persons who will be barred from receiving foreign funding include organisations of a political nature "not being a political party", associations or companies engaged in production or broadcast of audio news or audio-visual news or current affairs programmes through electronic mode or any other mode of mass communication.
This also includes correspondents or columnists, cartoonists, editors, owners of associations or companies relating to mass communication.
However, amounts received from any foreign source as a fee or payment for services rendered would be excluded from the definition of foreign contributions, the new bill proposed.
Briefing reporters, Union Finance Minister P Chidambaram said the new bill is aimed at providing a more efficient way to regulate expenditure, utilisation and accounting of foreign funding received in this country.
It also has a provision for proscribing the use of foreign contribution or any income arising out of it for speculative business.
Administrative expenses could not exceed 50 per cent of foreign contributions and any expenses beyond that limit can be incurred only with the Central government's prior approval.
It says government permission will be mandatory before receiving funds from abroad after the identification of the person, areas and purposes for which funding is required is mentioned.
The proposed bill also provides for use of foreign funding through more than one bank account, besides sharing of information with security agencies on contributions beyond the specified amount.
Information also has to be shared in case security agencies have any suspicions, it said.
The Bill also has provisions for compounding of certain offences, besides fixing 180 days as the upper limit for suspension of a registration certificate.
In order to maintain transparency, the proposed bill includes a provision whereby an individual or an organisation will have to be informed about the grounds on which registration has been refused.
The transparency provisions are in harmony with the Right to Information Act.
There would be automatic renewal of registration certificates for five years to all applicants, except in the case of defaulters.
The government had constituted a Group of Ministers who prepared the Bill with the Law Ministry.
The Home Ministry had referred proposed amendments to various ministries and departments, including the Intelligence Bureau, CBI and Enforcement Directorate, so that their views could be incorporated suitably, officials said.
After getting the cabinet's nod, the bill is expected to be placed before Parliament during its winter session beginning on November 22.
There are around 32,000 NGOs registered under the FCRA and 500 of them have been allowed to accept foreign funding.
The funds received by them from abroad in 2005-06 totalled about Rs 6,500 crores, officials said. |
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