PIONEER EDGE NEWS SERVICE/Dehradun
Passage of the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment Bill will definitely curtail the mentality behind religious conversion in Uttarakhand. Supporting the bill, the Bharatiya Janata Party State president and Rajya Sabha member Mahendra Bhatt said that the bill is necessary for national security reasons and the nation’s sovereignty also. The conspiratorial efforts behind religious conversion in Uttarakhand will also be checked by this legal measure, he said.
Bhatt said, “Various organisations and NGOs receive foreign funding. However, it is unfortunate that a large proportion of this funding is used for detrimental, anti-social and illegal activities. In Uttarakhand, especially in the mountainous areas, many organisations are consistently involved in religious conversion attempts under the guise of social works. The State government under chief minister Pushkar Singh Dhami has checked such activities through a strict anti-conversion law. In such a situation, the BJP wants to prevent even the mentality which feeds religious conversions through foreign funding,” he said.
Bhatt further said that the main aim behind amendment to FCRA is to bring about full transparency in the use of foreign funding, check illegal activities and to protect the nation’s democratic system from external interference. “We believe that foreign funding should not be used under any circumstances to the detriment of internal peace, social fabric of the nation or to influence national politics. This bill will also ensure that the foreign funding received is used only for the intended and legal purposes,” the BJP State president added.
