Mushrooming NGOs
- Sincere NGOs get little crumbs -
- Hueiyen Lanpao Editorial :: January 09, 2009 -

THE NON Government Organisation (NGO) is a nice idea created by altruists who sincerely wished to do something for the welfare of the humankind.

It is a tool which people with altruistic vision can use to uplift the conditions of human beings in such fields as health, environment, economy, human rights, etc. The role of the NGOs in the human world needs not be defined elaborately here, suffice it to say that the NGOs are inseparable parts of the established human society today.

There are plenty of areas in a state that its government cannot directly reach. It's where the NGOs, which are not under the direct control of the government, come in. There are kinds of NGOs which work in the international arena and there are other kinds which work in small local areas in specified fields.

Some large and international NGOs are highly praiseworthy with their long and chequered services to the minkind, and some small NGOs whose operations are limited to small areas do not have much for the people to pour encomiums on. Such NGOs of the latter kind are found in abundance in Manipur.

In fact, what with more than 800 registered NGOs in a state of around 2.4 million population, it's rather too much. And a majority of these NGOs do not even have their own operational base, nothing to say of an office. Such type of NGOs do exist only on paper and in the registration book in the office of the Registrar of Cooperative Societies.

These NGOs come out of their hibernation only when they feel the smell of funds about to be pumped in to the state by the international funding agencies through the central government or by the centre itself. This is not to underestimate the highly commendable contributions made by some particular NGOs.

But generally, there are too many other NGOs to which the welfare of the society is secondary, what is important to them is the money. That's how and why a battalion of NGOs had already cropped up on the scene, and still many more are in the making. What they have done and want to do is altogether a different question.

It's not only those unemployed but educated persons who, by chance or by choice, have set up their own NGOs but also surprisingly even some of the ministers or MLAs, who at present are in the ruling parties or had been in the government in the past have made millions and millions of rupees already.

These politicians are far-sighted and ever insatiably hungry for money. They are far-sighted in the sense that since they know they could be out of power and position one day, it must be ensured that they have various means of constant source of income in future. And setting up of NGOs either in the name of somebody else or his own is one such.

While one is in power, it is easy for him to get funds in terms of crores of rupees from the central authorities or foreign contributors in the name of an NGO working towards the development of this backward state.

The usual trick a politician plays around here is that he would set up an NGO in the name of some social workers, who would in fact be his trusted side-kicks. Then he would pull all the bureaucratic strings in the state secretariat and go to Delhi where he would beg and bribe some able officials out there to make it sure that his NGO gets the funds.

Thus a lion's share of the funds would be shared by the NGOs with their political bosses in the shadow while the true grassroot worker NGOs will have to remain satisfied with the little crumbs.

It would also be pertinent for the central authorities to check up the bonafide intentions of the NGOs before granting them the funds.