[Foundation-l] Fwd: Wikimedia India Program Trust

[Bishakha Datta]

On Fri, Nov 11, 2011 at 12:14 PM, Liam Wyatt <liamwyatt at gmail.com> wrote:

>
>
> Can you elaborate on the legal and practical differences between the new
> India Trust and the India Chapter?
>

Dear Liam,

Since I run a non-profit in India in my other life, I'll pitch in on one
part of this: the legal differences between the India trust and the India
chapter.

There are three common ways of legally incorporating a non-profit in India:
trust, society, section 25 company.

The chapter is registered as a society, traditionally considered a more
open incorporation structure, with members, elections etc. All these are
specified in its by-laws.

The program office is registered as a trust, which requires a minimum of
two trustees to function. A trust does not usually have members; trustees
can be appointed or elected (as per what's specified as the method on the
trust deed).

Check out the table at the bottom of the attachment [1] to get more details
on this.

Cheers
Bishakha

[1] http://www.ngosindia.com/resources/ngo_registration.php