NewsClick Raid Update: UAPA Funding Case against NewsClick | What really happened?
The FIR includes prominent names, such as Jason Pfetcher, manager of Worldwide Media Holdings and NewsClick’s editor-in-chief Prabir Purkayastha.
Navlakha also named in CBI FIR in NewsClick FCRA case
The CBI FIR in NewsClick FCRA violations case includes prominent names, such as Jason Pfetcher, manager of Worldwide Media
Holdings, NewsClick’s editor-in-chief Prabir Purkayastha, PPK NewsClick firm, and Shanghai-based businessman Neville Roy Singham, who is
of Sri Lankan-Cuban descent and an active member of the Propaganda department of the Communist Party of China, sources said. Activist Gautam Navlakha has also been named in the FIR.
According to a CBI spokesperson, the investigation suggests that the FCRA provisions, which prohibit acceptance of foreign contributions by companies engaged in producing and broadcasting audio-visual news or current affairs programmes through any electronic medium, were violated.
The latest development marks the second FIR against NewsClick since August, when the Delhi police’s special cell filed an FIR under the UAPA and subsequently arrested Purkayastha and the portal’s human resource head Amit Chakravarty last week. This was prompted by allegations made in a New York Times article that NewsClick was receiving payments to support Chinese propaganda. The FIR alleged that businessman Singham injected crores of rupees through NewsClick with the intention of disrupting India’s sovereignty and territorial integrity, causing disaffection against India, and threatening its unity, integrity, and security.
Singham is accused of investing substantial sums through a complex network of entities while circumventing rules for receiving foreign funds by NGOs.