Amit Shah launches revamped FCRA portal, e-OCI card
Union Home Minister Amit Shah on Tuesday launched a revamped online portal for regulating foreign contributions and the e-OCI Card, initiatives which would simplify compliance, improve public services and strengthen national security through greater use of technology.
In his address, the Home Minister said that prior to 2014, the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act (FCRA) system was entangled in files and procedures and was beyond proper oversight.
Shah said that after the Government led by Prime Minister Modi was formed in 2014, the system was strengthened.
“The renewal of the FCRA portal today will greatly enhance ease of operations for organisations,” he said.
The minister said that in the past years, there has been a significant increase in the number of applications and the flow of donations.
Keeping this in view, reducing paperwork and ensuring effective, real-time monitoring of foreign contributions are very important for the country’s security.
He said that due to the FCRA law, monitoring of foreign contributions coming with wrong intentions will increase.
The initiatives reflected the Government’s commitment to improving governance through technology while making services more accessible to citizens and organisations, he said.
The FCRA 2.0 Portal digitises all major processes related to foreign contribution regulation, including registration, renewal, annual returns and other services under the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Act.
The key provisions of the new FCRA Amendment rules, 2026, have also been incorporated into it.
According to the Ministry, the platform has been developed to simplify compliance while strengthening the monitoring and enforcement of foreign funding received by organisations.
“At present, around 14,500 active FCRA organisations are working across the country. Every year, approximately 15,000 to 20,000 applications and about 17,000 annual returns are received,” a Government statement said.
Hosted on the Government’s MeghRaj cloud platform, the portal includes Aadhaar-based authentication, e-Sign verification, Optical Character Recognition technology for document analysis and integration with NGO Darpan.
