10.24 percent of NGOs provide balance sheets: SC informed

Only 10.24 percent of the registered NGOs in the country have complied with the prerequisite of providing balance sheets and other financial details, CBI today informed the Supreme Court.
The affidavit filed by the agency gave data of NGOs from 21 states and seven Union Territories which have submitted their annual income-expenditure statements to the authorities concerned.
CBI submitted that out of 23,95,579 NGOs in 21 states, approximately 2,43,955 of them had filed their balance sheets with the authorities and, in seven Union Territories, of the 73,213 NGOs, only 50 have submitted their returns.
Placing a fresh affidavit, the agency told a bench comprising Chief Justice H L Dattu and Justice A K Sikri that the stage was all set to go ahead with the hearing on the issue of scrutinising alleged embezzlement of funds by the NGOs, as most states barring a few like Telangana have provided the balance sheets and other details of such registered organisations.

The agency, which filed the latest affidavit, said only a few states have not responded but the court could go ahead with the hearing.
Responding to the January 5 notice, Tamil Nadu provided details stating that out of about 1,55,608 NGOs, 2,0277 have provided their balance sheets, while no information was received from Telangana.

"Information from state of Telangana has not been received despite reminders. Further reminders in this regard have been issued," the CBI affidavit said.
Further, the affidavit said that in pursuance to the January 5 order, reminders were issued to Chief Secretaries of 10 states/UTs from whom either partial or no information was received and "in response thereof complete information has been received from Tamil Nadu and Union Territory of Delhi".

Maintaining that more time was required for compilation and analysing the entire information, CBI sought another three months time for it.
During the earlier hearing, Additional Solicitor General P S Patwalia had said the NGOs would not be eligible for any grant unless they complied with the condition of filing statements of income and expenditure of last three years.
The apex court had expanded the scope of the PIL which was filed in 2011 by advocate M L Sharma against an NGO, Hind Swaraj Trust, run by anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare.