The role of the State, in its relationship to NGOs, has turned from being a partner to being a regulator with the arrival of the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA) that has undergone more and more stringent revisions. The role is not only a regulator but to actually seeing NGOs as potential subverter or a threat to the role of the State so that NGOs are under increasing scrutiny, and oftentimes are being shut down with very arbitrary hardheaded action by the government, Vikram Patel, Paul Farmer Professor and Chair, Department of Global Health and Social Medicine, Harvard Medical School, said.
Delivering the 40th year oration of Schizophrenia Research Foundation (SCARF) (India) on “The power of civil society to transform India” on Saturday, he gave a clarion call to the government to treat NGOs as a trusted and essential partner for the country. NGOs, he said, have had a very long and impactful history in the country, evolving from individual acts of kindness to organised efforts that have transformed communities, the country and science.
“And yet today, there is an undeniable sense that the NGO sector is under siege, that it is somehow guilty of doing something wrong; maybe a financial impropriety. Perhaps worryingly that it is actually guilty of undermining the country’s development agenda or even worse that it is a Trojan horse for foreign powers, which fear India’s rise,” he said.
Citing an Intelligence Bureau report in 2014, he said the report accused foreign-funded NGOs of serving as tools for foreign policy interests of western governments. Unsubstantiated theories, he said, have led to the degradation of India’s NGO sector by squeezing tight the flow of funds to these organisations.
He recalled how the Public Health Foundation of India was stuck in 2017 when its FCRA license was taken away, with a similar stripping of the Centre for Policy Research, one of the most important policy research institutions the country has ever had. “Even if it was true that some NGOs were guilty of these allegations, it is a grotesque misrepresentation of the NGO sector that has been working in this country for more than a century, and has committed itself to so many social causes that have transformed our society,” Dr. Patel said.
The latest iteration of the FCRA has thrown a spanner in the works of one of the most important aspects of civil society which is to work in partnership with other organisations, he observed. “Here was a country that at one time celebrated its NGOs, with State-made grants to NGOs, where NGOs took India’s name far and wide as great examples of how India could change the world. It has travelled such a long distance with the government now mandating that NGOs are scrutinised to such an extent that the ability of NGOs to survive is now becoming increasingly threatened,” he stated.
He expressed concern that the setting up of the PM CARES fund meant an easy diversion for philanthropy directly to the government rather than to the civil society sector.
“We must hope for a better future for our NGOs, especially in terms of the relationship that NGOs have with the State. The degradation of the NGO sector, which strips our country of one of the most important pillars of our democracy, a pillar that historically offered a voice and addressed the needs of the dispossessed, the marginalised and neglected, but at the same time, also served as a unique incubator for science and innovation,” he said.
Soumya Swaminathan, chairperson, M.S.Swaminathan Research Foundation, said that no country can make progress without a robust and vigorous civil society.
V. Mohan, founder, Dr. Mohan Diabetes Specialities Centre, spoke on “Diabetes and Mental Health”. Citing a study - Integrating Depression and Diabetes Treatment, he said it showed how important it was to routinely screen for depression symptoms in diabetes clinics.
Lakshmi Vijayakumar, founder, SNEHA, spoke on “What we know and do not know about suicide?”. “Majority of persons who die by suicide are ambivalent and need a little care, understanding, hope and change in life,” she said.
R. Thara, vice chair, SCARF, gave an overview of the 40-year-long journey of the organisation. R. Seshasayee, chairman of SCARF and R. Padmavati, director of SCARF, also spoke.
