5 transactions in FCRA plaint

₹3.5 lakh allegedly received over the sale of a bus, ₹54,600 deposited, allegedly inadvertently, in the wrong account, ₹4.9 lakh received from a Swedish organisation to research on “youth migration, food security and sovereignty of the country, ₹19,600 returned to an alleged donor during Covid, ₹79,200 as alleged food fees.

- Prawesh Lama

These alleged five violations were deemed sufficient by the Union home ministry on Thursday to cancel the FCRA certification of Ladakh activist Sonam Wangchuk’s nongovernmental organisation, Students Educational and Cultural Movement of Ladakh(SECMOL).

‘According to the ministry's order dated September 25, the MHA‘s Foreigners II division, had first served the NGO a show cause notice on August 20, 2025, followed by a mail on September 10 asking why FCRA should not be cancelled.

SECMOL filed its reply on September 19. The MHA said that SECMOL(referred to as association in the order) was granted registration under Foreign Contribution(Regulation) Act 2010, to accept Foreign Contribution(FC) for undertaking cultural and educational programmes.

‘The first violation flagged by the ministry was about Wangchuk depositing ₹3.5 lakh in the FORA account. To this ,SECMOL replied that the amount was sale proceeds of an old bus procured on July 14, 2015 out of FCRA fund and reiterated that the sale proceeds of any asset procured from FCRA funds must be deposited in the FCRA account according to the rules.

The home ministry, however, said that the reply was “not tenable” and cited the fact that the amount was shown as “foreign donation from Wangchuk.”

“although credit entry of this much amount is not found in the FCRA account of the association. It seems that the amount has been received in cash in violation of section 17 of the Act which is not properly disclosed by the association in its reply,” the ministry noted.