On February 16, dubious organization Amnesty came out in support of alleged journalist Rana Ayyub who is currently under investigation for allegedly siphoning off the money she had collected in the name of Covid charity.
Amnesty wrote in a tweet, “We stand with Rana Ayyub as she continues to speak truth to power, even as she faces increasingly serious threats to her life. We also call on the Indian government to defend her rights under international law to practice journalism freely and safely.”
Amnesty’s accounts were frozen for not complying with FCRA laws
On September 10, 2020, the Enforcement Directorate, the same agency that froze Rana Ayyub’s 1.77 crore funds, had frozen all bank accounts of the organization’s India chapter over FCRA violation. On September 29, 2020, the organization closed its India’s chapter.
Notably, Amnesty India was not registered with FCRA to receive foreign funds. As per law, any NGO that wants to receive foreign funds has to register under FCRA. However, the government has stated that Amnesty International was never registered in India under the FCRA, which is needed for receiving foreign donations.
The organization has a long history of anti-India activities. In a report published in India in 2019, we explored the connections between Amnesty International India, the British government, and radical Islamists.
On several occasions, Amnesty India and its former head Aakar Patel kept peddling blatant lies and fake news to portray India negatively. It also campaigned for the arrested Urban Naxals in the Bhima Koregaon violence case.
Amnesty International received funding from governments though they had refused any such donations. As reported by NGO Monitor, in 2009, Amnesty received €2.5 million (approximately 1% of its donations) from governments that they used for its operations in India.
Amnesty was first raided in 2018 by ED for FCRA violation. In 2020, former Amnesty India head Aakar Patel was arrested for his defamatory tweets on PM Modi, BJP-RSS, and Ghanchi caste. Earlier, Patel’s Twitter account was withheld due to tweets instigating caste and communal violence in India.
Rana Ayyub allegedly siphoned off money she collected for charity
On February 10, OpIndia had reported that ED seized Rs 1.77 crore in Ayyub’s and her family’s accounts under the Prevention of Money Laundering Act. The ED has, in its attachment order, said, “Rana Ayyub has cheated the general Public Donors in a pre-planned manner and with the intention to cheat the general public donors”.
A few days after the expose, Ayyub alleged in a statement that she was being framed for her “journalism” and she did not misuse the money. However, all her claims were debunked by a Twitter user Hawk Eye who was the first to share details of alleged charity fraud last year.
