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A major international Christian charity will next week cease its aid operations in India, citing the Indian Government's refusal to let it accept foreign donations.
Compassion International says it has no choice but to formally end Indian operations on March 15, ending support for 147,000 impoverished children there.
The Indian Government claims two of its affiliates had been trying to convert children, and have refused pleas to reconsider from American diplomats and the organisation itself.
Chief executive of Australian arm Compassion Australia, Tim Hanna, said the decision is saddening, and ends nearly 50 years of aid in the country.
"Its hard to comprehend that you can just say, well there's 147,000 children who are getting help and support and we're going to not allow that help and support to continue," he said.
"That's hard for me in my mind to comprehend."
Newcastle man Jonathan Kirk and his wife have sponsored a child from northern India through Compassion Australia since 2010.
Mr Kirk, who has since joined Compassion as an employee, said his overriding emotion was one of frustration.
"I don't quite understand the thinking and the reasoning and the logic, this is hurting the most vulnerable," he said.
"Compassion works through local churches who provide things like medical professionals and tutors, and all of those things that we take for granted in Australia."
Allegations of proselytising
India's home ministry has barred Compassion's local partner organisations from receiving money from sponsors like Mr Kirk, alleging two tried to convert aid recipients to Christianity.
Home ministry officials who did not wish to be quoted said the charity's foreign donations were blocked because it was registered as a "social, cultural, economic and educational" organisation, and permitted to carry out religious activities.
Mr Hanna acknowledged the organisation is driven by a Christian ethos, but denied its staff were proselytising.
"We believe that would be the model Jesus would follow, he would look after the poor and care for them," he said.
"What Government might call proselytising, none of our staff work directly with kids, they work by training and equipping local church leaders to care for the poor.
"So it's not like we as an organisation do any of that anyway."
Compassion International's American management team expressed frustration the organisation was not allowed to refute the allegations before contributions were restricted.
A spokesman for India's ministry of external affairs said the process was "transparent" and that NGOs in India operate within a "well established legal framework".
Ongoing crackdown misuse of law: advocate
India's Government barred in excess of 10,000 NGOs from receiving foreign funds in 2015, in what advocates say is a misuse of laws designed to restrict foreign influence of Indian politics.
Rohini Mohan, a human rights researcher and author, said successive Indian governments have used the Foreign Contributions Regulation Act to limit criticism from abroad.
"They passed this law to prevent any meddling from what they called foreign hands," she said.
"It has become a tool for any government to go after civil society, political activism that is in any way criticising the government."
Organisations like Greenpeace and the Ford Foundation have been targeted for funding campaigns deemed "anti-national", but larger aid programs like Compassion's have not been affected until now.
Ms Mohan said Compassion may be a victim of the Government's desire to see Hindu-based charities doing more aid work.
"Along with anti-development, anti-national kind of rhetoric around NGOs, I think there is a larger sense today that Hindu organisations are somehow more objective and non-religious than Muslim or Christian, which is ridiculous," she said.
Topics: charities-and-community-organisations, christianity, charities, india
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