2002 Gujarat riots: Didn't receive any grants, donations for welfare of victims in 2007-14, asserts Teesta Setalvad

Top human rights activist, fighting the 2002 Gujarat riot victims' cases, Teesta Setavlad, has said the organizations she and her husband Javed Anand represent – Citizens for Justice and Peace (CJP) or Sabrang Trust – never applied or appealed for, or received grants or donations “intended for the financial assistance of any kind” for the welfare of the “victims-survivors of the 2002 communal carnage in Gujarat” between 2007 and 2014.
In a statement issued by her and Anand, Setalvad says, this is evident from the “voluminous documentary evidence submitted to the Gujarat police and in the courts”, which include “copies of grant agreements with donor organizations.”
The only thing the CJP applied or appealed for grants and donations was “to provide free legal aid to the survivors and eye-witnesses in their search for justice and punishment to the perpetrators of the mass crimes in 2002”, the statement says.
She adds, CJP’s trustees are “fully satisfied” with the funds the NGO received, as it helped the in securing “unprecedented, even historic, verdicts in favour of the survivors in the trial courts in Mumbai (Best Bakery Case) and Gujarat, Gujarat High Court and the Supreme Court.”
Setalvad's statement follows the reported claim of the Gujarat police before the Supreme Court that documentary evidence on Setalvad and her husband "siphoning off" Rs 3.85 crore for "personal use" from the Rs 9.75 crore donations received by the two NGOs for the “welfare” of the 2002 riot victims.
Running into 83-page affidavit, assistant commissioner of police, Gujarat, Rahul B Patel, accuses the Setalvad and Anand, as also other trusees of the two NGOs, of “non-cooperation” in providing documents needed to “investigate complaints” by riots victims of Gulbarg Society, which was one of the worst sites of massacre in 2002.
Gujarat police said, this became evident on “examining” the bank accounts of CJP and Sabrang Trust, adding, the couple also drew money for “personal use” from the Rs 1.40 crore grant given by the Union human resources development (HRD) ministry from February 2011 to July 2012.
Setalvad says, Gujarat police is “recycling spiced-up allegations without a shred of evidence”, adding, “the state police has chosen to completely ignore the over 20,000 pages of documentary evidence submitted to them.”
She agrees, in 2008, with the concurrence of members of the Gulberg Housing Society, Ahmedabad, Sabrang Trust did try to raise funds for building a Gulberg Resistance Memorial. But she adds, “The project had to be abandoned in 2012 due to insufficient funds” and the amount, Rs 4.6 lakh received as donation “is still reflected in the trust’s audited balance sheet as unutilized.”
Denying the allegation that the donation received by the Sabrang Trust from the HRD Ministry had also been embezzled, Setalvad says, there is a “new and equally baseless allegation”, adding, “To the best of our knowledge, the HRD ministry itself has made no such claim, at least till date.”

Comments

Irrational? Basis for fear among Hindus about being 'swamped' by Muslims

I was amused while reading an article titled "Ham Paanch, Hamare Pachees", shared on Facebook, by well-known policy analyst Mohan Guruswamy, an alumnus of the John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University, and the Graduate School of Business, Stanford University. Guruswamy, who has also worked as an advisor to the Finance Minister with the rank of Secretary to the Government of India, seeks to probe, as he himself states, "the supposed Muslim attitude to family planning"—a theme that was invoked by Narendra Modi as Gujarat Chief Minister ahead of the December 2002 assembly polls.

Why's Australian crackdown rattling Indian students? Whopping 25% fake visa applications

This is what happened several months ago. A teenager living in the housing society where I reside was sent to Australia to study at a university in Sydney with much fanfare. The parents, whom I often met as part of a group, would tell us how easily the boy got his admission with the help of "some well-meaning friends," adding that they had obtained an education loan to ensure he could study at a graduate school.

Tracking a lost link: Soviet-era legacy of Gujarati translator Atul Sawani

The other day, I received a message from a well-known activist, Raju Dipti, who runs an NGO called Jeevan Teerth in Koba village, near Gujarat’s capital, Gandhinagar. He was seeking the contact information of Atul Sawani, a translator of Russian books—mainly political and economic—into Gujarati for Progress Publishers during the Soviet era. He wanted to collect and hand over scanned soft copies, or if possible, hard copies, of Soviet books translated into Gujarati to Arvind Gupta, who currently lives in Pune and is undertaking the herculean task of collecting and making public soft copies of Soviet books that are no longer available in the market, both in English and Indian languages.

Gujarat slips in India Justice Report 2025: From model state to mid-table performer

Overall ranking in IJR reports The latest India Justice Report (IJR), prepared by legal experts with the backing of several civil society organisations and aimed at ranking the capacity of states to deliver justice, has found Gujarat—considered by India's rulers as a model state for others to follow—slipping to the 11th position from fourth in 2022.

Punishing senior citizens? Flipkart, Shopsy stop Cash on Delivery in Ahmedabad!

The other day, someone close to me attempted to order some goodies on Flipkart and its subsidiary Shopsy. After preparing a long list of items, this person, as usual, opted for the Cash on Delivery (popularly known as COD) option, as this senior citizen isn't very familiar with online prepaid payment methods like UPI, credit or debit cards, or online bank transfers through websites. In fact, she is hesitant to make online payments, fearing, "I may make a mistake," she explained, adding, "I read a lot about online frauds, so I always choose COD as it's safe. I have no knowledge of how to prepay online."

A conman, a demolition man: How 'prominent' scribes are defending Pritish Nandy

How to defend Pritish Nandy? That’s the big question some of his so-called fans seem to ponder, especially amidst sharp criticism of his alleged insensitivity during his journalistic career. One such incident involved the theft and publication of the birth certificate of Masaba Gupta, daughter of actor Neena Gupta, in the Illustrated Weekly of India, which Nandy was editing at the time. He reportedly did this to uncover the identity of Masaba’s father.

Not just Haren Pandya, even Dhirubhai Shah, youngest assembly speaker, wanted to be Gujarat CM

Dhirubhai Shah with Keshubhai Patel When Keshubhai Patel was sought to be replaced by the BJP high command in 2001, everyone knows that Narendra Modi became the final choice. However, someone who was part of the top circles those days now tells me something I had no knowledge of—that the choice was between Modi and a Kutch MLA, Dhirubhai Shah, who served as the 16th Speaker from March 1998 to December 2002 during the 10th Assembly, the youngest to take the office.

Of lingering shadow of Haren Pandya's murder during Modi's Gujarat days

Sunita Williams’ return to Earth has, ironically, reopened an old wound: the mysterious murder of her first cousin, the popular BJP leader Haren Pandya, in 2003. Initially a supporter of Narendra Modi, Haren turned against him, not sparing any opportunity to do things that would embarrass Modi. Social media and some online news portals, including The Wire , are abuzz with how Modi’s recent invitation to Sunita to visit India comes against the backdrop of how he, as Gujarat’s chief minister, didn’t care to offer any official protocol support during her 2007 visit to Gujarat.

Area set aside in Ahmedabad for PM's affordable housing scheme 'has gone to big builders'

Following my article on affordable housing in Counterview, which quoted a top real estate consultant, I was informed that affordable housing—a scheme introduced by Prime Minister Narendra Modi—has deviated from its original intent. A former senior bureaucrat, whom I used to meet during my Sachivalaya days, told me that an entire area in Ahmedabad, designated for the scheme, has been used to construct costly houses instead.

Search This Blog