The Supreme Court on Thursday directed social activist Teesta Setalvad to cooperate with the CBI and Gujarat Police investigation into the fund embezzlement case involving her NGO and warned that if it is established that she is refusing to cooperate, the stay on her arrest will be vacated.
Setting two-week time for Setalvad to supply all documents, the Bench of Justices AR Dave, FM Ibrahim Kalifulla and V Gopala Gowda said, “If she (Teesta) is not cooperating, we will vacate our order.”
The CBI had asked Setalvad on November 2, 2015 to show how the grant received from Ford Foundation between 2004 and 2009 was utilised. In reply, Setalvad submitted 4,723 documents, none of which had any relation to the documents asked for.
Solicitor-General Ranjit Kumar, who appeared for the agency, said Setalvad’s NGO Sabrang Communi-cations produced vouchers showing the money spent to pay their personal salaries and wages of employees, shopping lists, travel tickets, restaurant bills, etc. As per the agreement between Sabrang and Ford Foundation, money was to be spent on development and execution of projects, documentation, conducting workshops and seminars for achieving what the grant was meant for.