--- On Wed, 12/17/08, Samir Kelekar <[email protected]> wrote: > >You have become another Jose Colaco, playing a kathakali ! Are you also >>taking a law degree from Timbaktu? > >Santosh your mask of an unbiased, atheist guy is off and the whole Goanet >now >knows it!!! >
The above angry outburst is inexplicable and unusable from the standpoint of filing a complaint with U.S.-based authorities. I don't know how I can forward this email to them, and ensure that they will have any respect for Samir or myself. I had asked Samir or anybody else to kindly do the following: "Please provide me with actual first-hand evidence from a responsible law enforcement agency in a point-wise manner here that Ekal Vidyalaya, VHP America and/or Indicorps are/were directly involved in funding any kind of illegal or criminal activity in India or anywhere else." To this Samir copied and pasted a news report in The Hindu saying that the Indian government had stopped giving grants to an organization called Friends of Tribal Society that runs ekal vidyalayas because they do such things as make kids say "Jai Shri Ram" and use names of Hindu gods to teach the English alphabet. Marshall copied and pasted several websites, all of which, except one were recycled material from Samir's copy and paste job. The lone exception had some new allegations and speculations. Since neither Samir nor Marshall was capable of listing in a point-wise manner all the illegal and criminal activities carried out by Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation, I did the following: 1. I submitted an inquiry with the U.S. based Better Business Bureau at http://charityreports.bbb.org/public/inquire/Default.aspx?BureauID=9999 Here is the text of my inquiry: "I would like to know if Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation is a legitimate international charity, and whether funds from it have ever been diverted for any illegal or criminal activity locally or overseas. I would also like to know if any of its funds have been used to cause religious disharmony or for political activities. There are some accusations about the latter in the Indian print and internet media. Thanks." 2. I did a thorough search for legality of Ekal Vidyalaya Foundation, VHP America and IndiCorps on Guidestar (http://www.guidestar.org/index.jsp). The search indicated that they were legal 501c3 charities, and therefore by requirement not involved in any illegal, criminal or political activity. 3. Finally, I checked to see if any of them (and Friends of Tribals Society) was listed as a terrorist organization by the U.S. State Department at http://www.state.gov/s/ct/rls/fs/37191.htm on the basis of the following clause: "As used in this chapter [chapter 8 of the INA], the term 'engage in terrorist activity' means in an individual capacity or as a member of an organization– 1. to commit or to incite to commit, under circumstances indicating an intention to cause death or serious bodily injury, a terrorist activity;" None of them was listed. I will let you know as soon as the Better Business Bureau replies to my inquiry. Cheers, Santosh
