The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) received Rs 742 crore in donations during the 2018-19 fiscal year, an increase of 70 per cent compared to the previous year, a report compiled by the Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) has found. In the last financial year, the party received a donation of about Rs 437.04 crore.
The report mostly focused on donations above Rs 20,000.
According to the report, the donations by the party is thrice the aggregate of donations recieved by five other national parties. These national parties were the Congress, the Trinamool Congress, the Communist Party of India, the Communist Party of India (Marxist), the Nationalist Congress Party.
All the parties declared a total of Rs 951.66 crore in a donation in 2018-19. Of this, 78 per cent – a whopping Rs 742.15 crore was declared by the BJP alone.
‘The Bahujan Samaj Party declared that the party did not receive any donations above â¹20,000 during FY 2018-19, as it has been declaring for the past 13 years,’ the ADR report stated.
When compared to the previous financial year – 2017-18, the national parties’ declared a donation rise by 103 per cent in 2018-19, which was an election year.
The Congress’ donation increased from Rs 26.658 crore to Rs 148.58 crore. The non-governmental body found that most of the donation to these parties came from Maharashtra among states. The donors in Maharashtra donated a whopping of Rs 548.22 crore to the national parties. Delhi and Gujarat stood second and third respectively with a donation of Rs 141.42 crore and Rs 55.31 crore.
In the case of sectors, corporate or business sector donated more than 92 per cent of the total donation worth Rs 876.11 crore. Of the 1,776 donations made by corporate or business sector, the ruling party received 1,575 donations worth Rs 698.092 crore. The grand old party Congress got Rs 122.5 crore from 122 donations from the corporate or business sector.
The top donor was the Tata Group-controlled Progressive Electoral Trust, which gave a total of â¹455.15 crore to the BJP, the Congress, and the Trinamool.
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