FCRA licence to Naik’s NGO: 4 MHA officials suspended for ‘irregularities’

New Delhi: Four officials of the Home Ministry were tonight suspended for their alleged goof-up in renewing the FCRA licence of the NGO of Islamic preacher Zakir Naik, who is under the scanner of security agencies for his alleged radical views.

The officials, whose names and ranks were not known immediately, were suspended after the Home Ministry found that Naik’s NGO Islamic Research Foundation’s FCRA licence was renewed recently despite several ongoing probe against him.

“The four officials were suspended with immediate effect for their alleged role in the renewal of the FCRA licence of Naik’s NGO,” a Home Ministry official said. (More) PTI ACB

Naik has come under the scanner of the security agencies after Bangladeshi newspaper ‘Daily Star’ had reported that one of the attackers of the July 1 terror strike in Dhaka, Rohan Imtiaz, ran a propaganda on Facebook last year quoting Naik.

He in a lecture, aired on Peace TV, an international Islamic channel, had reportedly “urged all Muslims to be terrorists”.

The popular but controversial Islamic orator is banned in the UK and Canada for his hate speech aimed against other religions. He is among 16 banned Islamic scholars in Malaysia.

He is popular in Bangladesh through his Peace TV, although his preachings often demean other religions and even other Muslim sects.

PTI