Here is more from the Washington Post:
An independent think tank. A law firm. An environmental group.
On Sept. 7, Indian tax authorities simultaneously raided three seemingly unrelated nonprofit organizations without issuing a public statement, confounding many in Indian academia and politics. But one little-known thread connected the three groups: Each was seen by the government to be a critic of Gautam Adani, one of India’s richest men and a political ally of Prime Minister Narendra Modi.
At the Center for Policy Research (CPR), widely considered India's top independent think tank, more than a dozen officials and armed police officers confiscated computers and phones and sealed the building, locking some employees inside their rooms, according to three people who were present.
In the ensuing months, documents showed, investigators pored through the nonprofits’ emails and phone records and laid out a lengthy array of allegations. The government cited the allegations as the basis for administrative actions that seemed designed to cripple the nonprofits, Indian and international activists and scholars say.
CPR was accused of improperly obstructing Adani’s Hasdeo mine by “giving directions” to protest leaders, the think tank’s correspondence with investigators shows. Authorities alleged that researchers affiliated with the think tank were using U.S. funding for litigation — something that is outlawed in India.
The Washington Post notes that earlier this year Indian authorities froze the foreign-currency bank accounts of CPR. Citing seven current and former CPR employees, the Post notes that the think tank, starved of funding, is likely to sharply downsize or shut down completely. CPR had 200 employees at its peak.
Here is a letter from concerned international faculty and researchers about what has been happening at CPR.
