Overview
- Union Home Minister Amit Shah launched the FCRA 2.0 portal and the electronic OCI (e-OCI) card in New Delhi, which launched June 30, 2026, as live government platforms for end-to-end digital processing of foreign contribution filings and OCI services.
- The portal uses Aadhaar-based authentication, e-Sign, optical character recognition for documents and API links to PAN, OCI records, NGO Darpan and the ICAI UDIN system, and it is hosted on the government’s MeghRaj cloud to centralize records and reduce data-theft risk.
- The e-OCI converts the physical OCI booklet into a downloadable digital credential, removes the need to reissue booklets after a passport renewal at age 20 and is expected to benefit more than 5 million cardholders by enabling online updates and real-time verification.
- The Home Ministry said the system responds to scale — about 14,500 active FCRA organisations, roughly 15,000–20,000 annual applications and about 17,000 returns — and announced planned rollouts of an FCRA mobile app, an AI chatbot and a bank-facing dashboard in coming months.
- Opposition parties and some civil-society groups warned the tighter rules and live cross‑database monitoring expand administrative control over NGOs and could constrain legitimate work, while government supporters say the changes implement the Foreign Contribution (Regulation) Amendment Rules, 2026 to curb misuse of foreign funds.