Is the funding issue the only issue that is the
problem? It appears that
there are other issues as well. The EC members except for Abhinav, who is a
recent inductee, are silent. They need to speak up to give their view on
all the issues concerned, especially as they were in the EC during the
period of non-compliance.
On Sat, Jul 20, 2019, 7:51 AM Subhashish Panigrahi <
psubhashish(a)gmail.com> wrote:
I feel that there is a lot of negativity which
comes from some genuine
frustrations but also impulsive action. As the situation is fairly complex,
it would be useful to stick to the facts only. A lot of new subscribers to
this list who might not have context will simply be affected adversely if
this continues. My note below is not to undermine the efforts or genuine
interests of anyone but to share some clarity around compliance based on
some similar experiences.
When Anirudh’s response gives a good sense of FCRA, I just wanted to
reiterate the fact that receiving FCRA approval has a 50:50 chance and it
is a three-year long process. Clean records, full-time staff and a long
list high-impact activities can still lead to a decline if one doesn’t have
the right kind of connections. However, an NGO can apply for a prior
permission for a one time foreign funding for a standalone activity and the
chances of receiving that funding is higher as compared to a regular FCRA
approval. Coming from a donor’s perspective as I was dealing with the same
issue of funding Indian affiliates for an organization that I worked for, I
believe, FCRA should not be compliance criterion for any Indian NGO. Many
NGOs that have a much longer history and have done a lot of paid work (and
hence in large volumes) with bigger teams (and especially lawyers on the
payroll) have failed to acquire FCRA just because of their activities and
publications that might have openly criticized a government.
Furthermore, a mission-aligned NGO with FCRA approval can always help
another smaller NGO as a fiscal sponsor till the time the latter builds a
portfolio with some local grants. This has to be done very carefully so
that the funding doesn’t look like a circumvention of FCRA meaning that the
entire activities will need to be organized/co-organized by the fiscal
sponsor. In real terms, no matter who is involved in the activity, all the
work, vendor payments, and even the branding must include the fiscal
sponsor. It becomes the said fiscal sponsor’s activity funded by a foreign
donor and supported by volunteers or paid contractors from other
collectives/NGOs. Considering the hardship (or more of chances of a
ballgame) this is probably a model a donor organization like WMF can
explore so that individuals or collectives don’t have to pay taxes while
receiving any funding. This arrangement might have a compliance cost factor
and availability of staff as the fiscal sponsor has to pay its staff and
should have the bandwidth to manage the additional work.
Another model that IEEE and many others have explored is allowing
nonprofit (and even for-profit companies) to become the grantee. I’m not
very sure of the tax exemption part but I believe that a for-profit company
can only receive investments (and not grants) and must pay tax. That could
be an extra expense but it’s much safer. The actual work must be reported
as a work by this company just like the previous situation. IMHO foreign
nonprofit donors should definitely have the flexibility (that the grantee
profile can range from a not-for-profit society or trust or company to a
for-profit company) for their Indian grantees because it’s risky to operate
as an NGO in India since the last few years and manage to get FCRA approval
at the same time while doing good work. When Wikipedia is all about open
knowledge sharing in multiple languages, issues related map/border can work
against a grantee and the law enforcement agencies can go behind them.
My request to WMF and AffCom would be to reconsider WMIN’s situation
with the lens of FCRA-related compliance issues because FCRA as a
compliance factor could jeopardize any smaller Indian NGO.
Subhashish
On Jul 20, 2019, at 2:36 AM, Sudhanwa Jogalekar <sudhanwa.com(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
Hi,
I have replied on the thread on meta. Copying that content here for
reference:
Anirudh has already mentioned most of the points I also wanted to say.
(Check here:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimediaindia-l/2019-July/014215.html)
I will add a few more things here. WMF is very very keen on all kinds
of legal compliance. The recent example is the "Germany court order".
Surprisingly, possibly for the first time in Wikipedia history, all the
relevent content was WIPED out from Wikipedia within a day of the court
order where only one person was affected by the content. Compared to that,
here in India, FCRA issue is affecting thousands of organisations in a
serious way and AFFCOM is still not able to understand the FCRA compliance
issue. (Maybe, compared to Indian languages, German language is better
understood by concerned people!!)By the way, What was the support
given by WMF/AFFCOM to WMIN in the FCRA matters? Have they provided any
consultant or legal help to WMIN. Or even some high level contacts in the
concerned Government office to put up our case further.It will also be
interesting to know if by any chance, CIS looses FCRA, (I sincerely wish
that does not happen anytime) AFFCOM/WMF will remove their affiliation?
Read the WMF news article here:
https://wikimediafoundation.org/news/2019/04/11/a-german-court-forced-us-to…
Indian
Wikipedian community is very very keen on expenditure, especially wherever
they feel that some wrong expenditure is made (not just by Indian
organisation but even when WMF money is spent) They become very very
concerned about it and become very vocal. Mail thread goes on for months
asking for justificaiton of such expenditure.(eg. check here:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimediaindia-l/2018-July/013400.html)
Hardly anyone from WMF/AFFCOM comment on it. Compared to that, when India
chapter is not spending any money and doing all zero budget activities,
what could be the problem with it for the community or AFFCOM or WMF.
Actually they should appriciate and should be happy about saving lots of
money and still doing activities. The closure of India chapter topic
comes up again and again and some lengthy discussions happen on it. I am
referring to one such mail thread a few years back and specificaly want WMF
people to read my comment that time in a reply to Gerard Meijssen. Please
check it out here:
https://lists.wikimedia.org/pipermail/wikimediaindia-l/2014-September/01156… Now
that AFFCOM is showing so much concern about the India activities, it will
be better if they can tell us (the stake holders in this- Indian
Wikipedians, volunteers, current and past WMIN EC members and general WMIN
members) the comparision of performance of affiliates in India namely WMIN
and CIS-A2K. What is the expenditure on various activities, paid staff etc
etc. And give us a clear understanding of where the real objection is. I
suppose this should be with reference to the contract between WMF and WMIN.
I read the contract document again some time back and could hardly see any
possible serious violation of the contract that AFFCOM is referring to.
Regards
-Sudhanwa
On Thu, Jul 18, 2019 at 5:13 PM Anirudh S. Bhati <anirudhsbh(a)gmail.com>
wrote:
> For now I am not going to get into other issues, but would like to get
> clarification on the following:
>
> On Thu, Jul 18, 2019 at 6:20 PM Chris Koerner <ckoerner(a)wikimedia.org>
> wrote:
>
>>
>> Wikimedia India was first recognized as a chapter in 2011. In 2015, it
>> experienced difficulties meeting chapter agreement obligations.
>> Working with the Affiliations Committee and the Foundation, the
>> chapter developed a plan of action and returned to good standing by
>> 2017. However, between 2017 and 2019
>>
>>
>> *the chapter was unable to secure a license to act as a fiduciary
>> organization, and is not currently legally registered as a charity in India
>> to accept funding from the Foundation*. The Foundation and
>> Affiliations Committee both hope that
>> this licensing and registration can be secured, and that the chapter
>> will again be eligible for recognition.
>>
>
> AFAIK, the Wikimedia Chapter (Wikimedia India) *is* registered as a
> charitable society under the Karnataka Societies Registration Act.
> Therefore, it *is* a fiduciary organization acting in public interest. I
> would like to hear a clarification on your claims above.
>
> Further, my understanding is that the Chapter has been unable to
> renew/secure its permissions under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation)
> Act, which prevents it from receiving funds from foreign sources, including
> the Foundation. This is not a situation unique to Wikimedia India, as more
> than 20,000 NGOs nationally faced cancellations of their licenses last year
> due to reasons that have largely to do with politics rather than compliance
> related issues.
>
>
>
https://www.firstpost.com/india/fcra-licences-of-20000-ngos-cancelled-act-b…
>
> If the inability of Wikimedia india to secure these permissions is one
> of the primary reasons for de-recognition, as a founding member of
> Wikimedia India and as someone who is largely an external observer, it
> appears to me that the Foundation is choosing to punish the chapter for not
> having the political clout to retain its license. For most of its
> existence, the Wikimedia Chapter has been a volunteer-run body with limited
> expertise in public policy. Can you please clarify whether the Foundation
> has extended support to the Chapter in form of, for example, contracting a
> government relations specialists to help renew/secure their FCRA license?
>
> Looking forward to hearing from you.
>
> Yours,
> Anirudh
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