Karnataka High Court quashes 2019 ED complaint against Greenpeace in foreign funding case

The Karnataka High Court recently quashed a complaint filed by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) against Greenpeace Environment Trust and its affiliate Greenpeace India Society in 2019, accusing them of violating the provisions of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA) [Greenpeace Environment Trust v. Union of India and ors, and a connected matter]

Justice Suraj Govindraj on June 12 allowed two writ petitions filed by them in 2021 to seeking quashing of the complaint filed by an Assistant Director of the ED. The single-judge also quashed a show cause notice issued by the ED in the matter in 2020.

"The complaint dated 25.02.2019 filed by respondent No.3 at Annexure-B in both the petitions are quashed," the Court ordered.

The Court accepted Greenpeace's argument that the case was covered by an earlier ruling passed by a co-ordinate bench on the plea filed by its former Executive Director Kshithija Urs.

In the ruling passed in Urs' case in December 2024, Justice Anu Sivaraman had ruled that the ED could not have invoked Section 6 (3) of FEMA against him since the provision was omitted by the Finance Act of 2015.

This omission was made effective from October 15, 2019 by a notification, which preceded the registration of the ED complaint against Greenpeace on October 25, 2019, the Court had found.

Considering the same, Justice Govindraj noted that there is no dispute that the proceedings against Greenpeace also had been initiated after the omission of Section 6(3)(b) of FEMA.

"In that view of the matter, applying the dicta laid down by the Coordinate Bench of this court in its order dated 6.12.2025 [2024] passed in W.P. No.1418/2021, the above petition is require to be allowed," the Court ordered.

According to media reports, the ED had accused Greenpeace of colluding with an Indian company Direct Dialogue Initiatives India Pvt Ltd (DDIIPL) to raise and transfer foreign money to Greenpeace India, and to facilitate its operational activities. 

The same was done in violation of FEMA after the cancellation of Greenpeace's license under Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA), as per the ED.

Greenpeace had denied the allegations, reportedly maintaining that it only partnered with DDIIPL to get in touch with donors, adding that donations were then directly sent to Greenpeace.

Advocate Monica Patil appeared for Greenpeace. Central Government Counsel M Unnikrishnan represented the ED.

Greenpeace has faced several legal troubles in India, which peaked in 2015 with the cancellation of its FCRA license.

At the time, the Indian Home Ministry issued a statement that there were serious allegations of Greenpeace’s involvement in what it called ‘anti-development’ activities. In an affidavit filed in 2015 before the Delhi High Court, the Ministry of Home Affairs has stated the cancellation was due to a number of statutory violations.

The move meant Greenpeace's India wing could not longer accept charitable donations from abroad.

The ED too later initiated proceedings against Greenpeace. In 2018, it raided Greenpeace offices and froze its bank accounts, a move that was later set aside by the Karnataka High Court in 2019 after it noted that the ED's October 2018 communication to various banks in which Greenpeace maintained its accounts, had expired with the passage of time.

[Read High Court order]