Rights groups under close watch in Kerala

THIRUVANANTHAPURAM - Some human rights organisations in Kerala are being closely watched after allegations they were stocking arms and indulging in undesirable activities, Home Minister Kodiyeri Balakrishnan told the assembly Wednesday.

“Even though there are some such organisations that are doing a good job, some recent organisations which have surfaced are working with different objectives and hence police are closely watching them,” said Balakrishnan.

He said this in response to a call attention motion raised by Communist Party of India-Marxist (CPI-M) legislator P. Viswan who said some organisations operating under the guise of human rights were stocking arms and were engaged in undesirable activities.

“Another feature of such organisations is even though they don’t collect funds through contributions from here, they receive huge sums of money from abroad. Under the guise of working for the downtrodden, they do undesirable activities,” said Viswan.

Balakrishnan said: “With regard to the funding issue, the state government cannot do much and hence our chief minister himself has written to the centre to see that they do a proper investigation to find the source of funds of such organisations.”