Ahmedabad

Teesta Setalvad and her husband made a “business out of charity”, the Crime Branch of Ahmedabad police has alleged in an affidavit filed recently in the Gujarat High court by saying that “not one penny” from over a crore of rupees raised out of art auctions and musical concert was disbursed among Gujarat riots victims of 2002.

The crime branch in its affidavit has said that Teesta through her NGO Citizen for Justice & Peace (CJP) organised musical concerts and art auctions and advertisements were made for raising funds for the riots victims and even donations were sought for purchasing ambulances after 26/11 terror strike at Mumbai.

The ACP Crime Branch filed this affidavit on August 3 opposing de-freezing of Teesta’s accounts.

The matter was listed today in the court of Justice Sonia Gokani.

The affidavit is related to the case of embezzlement of funds for a museum at Gulbarg society, damaged in the 2002 riots in which the state police claimed that probe has revealed that Setalvad and her husband Javed Anand “misappropriated” funds for use of “very personal nature including purchase of wine and whisky.

Police said no money including the hefty Rs one crore generated from art auction held in October 2008 for Sabrang Trust and Rs 22.10 lakh gathered from another art auction held in April 2012 for CJP was disbursed among riots victims and only two ambulances were purchased by the CJP which had collected Rs 37.5 lakh through musical concert and donations in 2009.

The affidavit says that according to Teesta Rs 60 lakh was expenditure on the auction in Mumbai from an earning of Rs, one crore was made but she did not furnish even one supporting voucher for the expenses claimed or the gross amount received.

“Assuming that petitioners are right, a net amount of Rs 40 lakhs was received by the (Sabrang) trust. Even out of this net amount of Rs 40 lakhs, an amount of Rs 25 lakhs was transferred to the CJP, leaving an amount of only Rs 15 lakhs out of the art proceeds with Sabrang trust.

“Although the advertising blitzkrieg soliciting donation for riot victims had commenced, not one penny out of the art auction receipts was disbursed in any manner to or expended on the riot victims,” the affidavit said.

It said the couple were asked to furnish the stock details of the paintings received, sold and those lying in stock but they refused to reply.

The Affidavit further stated that similarly, in April 2012, the couple advertised and conducted an art auction, ‘Art for Humanity’ whose object was to benefit victims of violence and the proceeds of Rs 22.10 lakhs were accounted as donations in CJP.

“As per the CJP website a total of 79 paintings were donated by different artist. However, only nine paintings were sold in financial year 2012-13 and the proceeds of Rs 22.10 lakhs were accounted as donations in CJP.

“The website, however, continues to show that unsold paintings are still available for sale,” it said. The police said the investigation has revealed that out of the admitted sale proceeds of Rs 22.10 lakhs received in CJP’s bank accounts, “not a single penny was ever disbursed to riot victims” and money raised for them was never given to them.

The affidavit said that after the 26/11 Mumbai attack, the petitioners advertised that there was shortage of ambulances and lives could have been saved during the terror strike had there been sufficient ambulances and they used this ruse to raise donations for CJP allegedly to purchase ambulances.

Teesta and her husband had sought to purchase ambulances to be used for the benefit of citizens of Mumbai by diverse means such as soliciting foreign funds, local funds and organizing a music concert on March 21, 2009.

“Through these methods CJP received a donation of about Rs 37.5 lakhs in the financial years 2008-09 and 2009-10. Out of this amount, Rs 22 lakhs was received as foreign donation, Rs 11 lakhs from local donations and Rs 4.5 lakhs from the proceeds of the music concert and box collections there at,” it said.

It added the petitioners had claimed that Rs 20 lakh was received from the music concert and Rs 17 lakh was defrayed towards its expenses but no supporting vouchers have been submitted to the investigating agency and the alleged expenses were “unsubstantiated”.

“Investigation based on the limited documents furnished by the petitioners has revealed that the funds raised by CJP for ambulance services was utilized as follows:- “Two ambulances were purchased in late 2009 for a total sum of Rs 14 Lakhs. These ambulances were delivered to a private ambulance service provider called Ziqitza Health Care Limited for no consideration what so ever,” it said. Ziqitza is not a charitable institution and runs ambulances services on chargeable basis.”The remainder amount of Rs 11 lakhs has been transferred by the petitioners to the General Funds of CJP and obviously utilized for purposes other than that for which donations were solicited and paid to CJP. This constitutes a diversion of funds and accordingly a fraud on both donors and victims of terror attacks,” it added.

– DeshGujarat