The government of India has refused to renew the foreign funding license for a charity founded by Mother Teresa.
The Missionaries of Charity (or Missionaries of Charity) group has thousands of nuns overseeing projects such as homes for abandoned children, schools and clinics.
On Christmas Day, India’s Ministry of Interior announced that it has not renewed the registration due to “adverse information”.
Hindus have long accused the charity of using its programs to convert people to Christianity.
The charity denied these charges. In a statement released on Monday, the institution confirmed that its request for renewal had been denied and said it would not move any external financing accounts “until the matter is resolved.”
Previously, West Bengal’s chief minister, Mamata Banerjee, received criticism after writing on Twitter that the government had frozen the charity’s bank accounts. But the government and the country have since denied that the accounts had been frozen.
The Calcutta-based institution was founded in 1950 by Mother Teresa, a Roman Catholic nun who moved from her native Macedonia to India. It is one of the best known Catholic charities in the world.
Mother Teresa received the Nobel Peace Prize in 1979 for her humanitarian work and was declared a saint by Pope Francis in 2016, 19 years after her death.
Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government has sought to squeeze foreign funding to India-based charities and other NGOs. Last year, restrictions led to the freezing of bank accounts belonging to Greenpeace and Amnesty International.
There have also been numerous attacks on religious minorities across India.
According to the Evangelical Fellowship of India, attacks were prominent in the southern state of Karnataka, with nearly 40 reports of threats or violence.
Hindu vigilante groups have disrupted Christmas celebrations in parts of the country this year, protesting outside religious meetings and vandalizing a church in northern India.
The majority of the population of India is Hindu. But there are about 24 million Christians in the country — about 2% of the population — and India is home to Asia’s second-largest Catholic community, after the Philippines.
Authorities tried to crack down on alleged campaigns to convert Hindus to Christianity and Islam.
Several states governed by the BJP (Bharatiya Janata Party or Indian People’s Party) have recently passed (or are considering passing) laws prohibiting religious conversion for marriage.
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