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The Delhi High Court today issued notice to the Ministry of Home Affairs in a plea by a registered charitable trust seeking interim protection from coercive action for their inability to file their annual returns for the Financial Year (FY) 2019-20 as mandated under the Foreign Contributions Regulation Act, 2010, (FCRA) due to technical glitches on the "FCRA Online" website. 

The trust said that it was not the only one that had been unable to file form FC-4 electronically on the FCRA portal of the Ministry of Home Affairs due to technical glitches. They submitted that many others had faced similar issues due to which they had failed to file their annual returns before the deadline of Jun 30.

Taking note of the submission, the single judge bench of Justice Rekha Palli restrained the Ministry of Home Affairs from taking coercive action against the petitioner.

The petition has been filed by Shri Swami Narayan Mandir, a charitable trust involved in carrying out social, devotional, medical, and religious charitable activities.

The petitioner argued that it was impossible for the petitioner to fill out the form FC-4 and to comply with the requirements of the law due to technical glitches beyond their control. The counsel submitted that they received large numbers of donations and had faced technical issues while filling all details as required on the website.

The petitioner elaborated that Form FC-4 required them to provide the details of their account in the SBI Main Branch, New Delhi. However, for FY 2019-20, the FCRA did not mandate the petitioner to have an account in the SBI Main Branch. 

The onerous mandate of opening an SBI account was brought to force vide notification issued in September 2020.

Prior to this notification petitioner could open their FCRA account in the designated scheduled banks all over the country. The requirement to mandatorily have an account in the SBI Main Branch, New Delhi, only arose in late September 2020. 

Consequently, in compliance of the MHA’s notification, the Petitioner had without fail opened the FCRA savings account in SBI Bank and got approval regarding the same from the FCRA division on Mar 16, 2021.

The petitioner submits that that, "It is a well settled principle that the law will not require a person to do an impossible act."

In view of the same, the petitioner sought protection submitting that the said form is required to be filed urgently and a failure to file returns within the prescribed timeline carries dire consequences under the FCRA with heavy penalties and even cancellation of registration under Section 14 of the FCRA.

The petitioner has thus sought a direction to allow it to upload the Form FC-4 forthwith on the portal so as to enable the petitioner to file their annual returns for the Financial Year 2019-20.

The court has listed the matter for next hearing on Sep 3, 2021.

Advocates Rajat Bhatia and Manoj Khanna appeared for the petitioner Trust.

 

Case Title: Shri Swami Narayan Mandir vs UOI