Business houses donated Rs 956.77 crore to political parties in 4 years -Governance Now

Business houses donated Rs 956.77 crore to political parties in 4 years

BJP received the maximum donations of Rs 705.81 crore from 2,987 corporate donors followed by Congress which received a total contribution of Rs 198.16 crore from 167 corporate donors

GN Bureau | August 17, 2017

#political funding #Association for Democratic Reforms #donations #politics

(Illustration: Ashish Asthana)

Business houses loosened their purse strings while making donations to political parties, showed an analysis carried out by Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR).

Various sectors of business houses, between FY 2012-13 and 2015-16, donated a total of Rs 956.77 crore, constituting 89% of the total contribution to political parties from known sources, said ADR.

Out of the five National Parties, BJP received the maximum donations of Rs 705.81 crore from 2,987 corporate donors followed by Congress which received a total contribution of Rs 198.16 crore from 167 corporate donors.

Between FY 2012-13 and 2015-16, BJP’s and Congress’ voluntary contributions above Rs 20,000 from corporate/business houses is 92% and 85% respectively.

CPI and CPM have the lowest share of corporate donations at 4% and 17% respectively.

Incidentally, national parties have received the maximum corporate donations in the FY 2014-15, when the Lok Sabha elections were held. Corporate donations received in FY 2014-15 alone forms 60% of the total corporate donations received between FY 2012-13 and 2015-16.

Donations from corporates to National Parties reduced by 86.58% between FY 2014-15 and 2015-16.

The analysis threw up some interesting information.

Despite not donating during FY 2012-13, Satya Electoral Trust was the top donor to three of the national parties, between FY 2012-13 and 2015-16. The Trust donated a total of 35 number of times in 3 years, amounting to Rs 260.87 crore.

BJP declared receiving Rs 193.62 crore while the Congress was the recipient of Rs 57.25 crore of funds from the trust. NCP received Rs 10 crore from Satya Electoral Trust during the same period.

General Electoral Trust, which was formed before the Electoral Scheme was launched by the Government in 2013, was the second highest corporate donor to BJP and Congress. Between FY 2012-13 & 2015-16, the Trust donated Rs 70.7 crore and Rs 54.1 crore to the two national parties, respectively.

The ADR analysis showed that the real-estate sector was the biggest donor to the national parties during FY 2012-13, contributing a total amount of Rs 16.95 crore to the parties. BJP received the highest contribution of Rs 15.96 crore followed by Congress with Rs 95 lakh and CPM with Rs 4 lakh.

Trusts and Groups of Companies with varied interests in mining, real-estate, power, newspapers etc., donated the highest amount of Rs 419.69 crore, between FY 2013-14 to 2015-16, to the national parties.

Between FY 2012-13 & 2015-16, manufacturing sector was the second highest overall contributor, contributing a total of Rs 123.67 crore to the 5 national parties.

ADR said that BJP, Congress and NCP, all three received the maximum contributions from Trusts & Group of companies. BJP received the highest, Rs 287.69 crore from Trusts & Group of companies, followed by Congress with Rs 129.16 crore and NCP with Rs 15.78 crore.

BJP received the highest donations from all 14 sectors including real-estate (Rs 105.20 crore), mining, construction, exports/ imports (Rs 83.56 crore), chemicals/ pharmaceuticals (Rs 31.94 crore).

It went on to say that a total of 1933 donations through which national parties received Rs 384.04 crore do not have PAN details in the contribution form.

National parties have received Rs 355.08 crore from 1546 donations which do not have address details in the contribution form.

A staggering 99% of such donations without PAN and address details worth Rs 159.59 crore belong to the BJP.

Analysis of Donations from Corporates & Business Houses to National Parties - FY 2012-13 to 2015-16

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