New Delhi: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has received more than 88% of total donations declared by national parties for the financial year 2023-24, a report by poll watchdog Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) has revealed.The report published on Monday (April 7) found that of the total Rs 2544.278 crore received by six national political parties, the BJP received Rs 2243.947 crore. The report also found that while corporate donations were the largest source for all donations to all six parties amounting to 88.92% of the total donations, the BJP received the lion’s share of these donations. Of the total Rs 2262.5537 crore received as corporate donations to all six parties, the BJP received Rs 2064.58 crore or 91.2% of these donations.The report analyses donations above Rs 20,000 received by the six national parties, according to the details submitted to the Election Commission of India (ECI) for the FY 2023-24 filed by September 30, 2024. The six national parties include the BJP, Congress, Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Bahujan Samaj Party (BSP), Communist Party of India (Marxist) (CPI(M)) and the National People’s Party (NPP).BJP tops list The report found that of the total Rs 2544.278 crore received by six national political parties, the BJP received Rs 2243.947 crore from 8358 donations.“The donations declared by the BJP are more than six times the aggregate declared by INC, AAP, NPEP, and CPI(M) for the same period,” the report said. ADR uses ‘NPEP’ for the National People’s Party, usually identified by the acronym ‘NPP’.This was followed by the Congress which received Rs 281.48 crore. The AAP received Rs 11.062 crore, followed by the CPI(M) that received Rs 7.641 crore, followed by the NPP that received Rs 0.148 crore. The BSP declared that it had not received any donations above Rs 20,000 as it has been declaring for the last 18 years.The largest source of political donations to the parties came in the form of corporate donations, in which the BJP received the largest amount. A total of Rs 2262.5537 crore received as corporate donations to all six parties, while Rs 270.872 crore (10.6%) came from individual donors.Of the total Rs 2262.5537 crore received as corporate donations to all six parties, the BJP received Rs 2064.58 crore or 91.2% of these donations. “BJP (Rs Rs 2064.58 crore) received more than nine times the total amount (Rs 197.9737 crore) of corporate donations declared by all other national parties for the FY 2023-24,” the report noted.This was followed by the Congress which received Rs 190.3263 crore from corporate or business sectors.Congress records highest increase in political donationsWhile the BJP received the lion’s share of political donations, the Congress on the other hand recorded a higher rise in these donations in comparison to the previous year.While donations to the BJP increased by 211% rising from Rs 719.858 crore in FY 2022-23 to Rs 2243.947 crore, the donations to the Congress increased by 252% in the same period. The Congress which had received Rs 79.924 crore in FY 2022-23, recorded an increase in its donations that jumped to Rs 281.48 crore in FY 2023-24.Donations declared by the AAP increased by 70.1% (Rs 26.038 crore), while that to the NPEP increased by 98.02% (Rs 7.331 crore).Prudent electoral trust tops donations againThe report also found that the Prudent Electoral Trust was the top donor to parties, providing a total of Rs 880.0775 crore to the BJP and Congress together. The trust donated Rs 723.675 crore to the BJP and Rs 156.4025 crore to the Congress. Prudent has earlier also featured as BJP’s biggest donor according to ADR’s year-by-year analysis of electoral trusts.According to the ECI website, the donors to Prudent include the RP Sanjiv Goenka Group, Megha Engineering & Infrastructure Limited, Bharti Airtel, GMR, DLF group among others.RP Sanjiv Goenka Group, Megha Engineering & Infrastructure Limited, Bharti Airtel,, DLF were also among major contributors to the now scrapped electoral bonds scheme.The difference between electoral bonds and electoral trusts is that while bonds could until earlier last year be bought anonymously by individuals and corporate entities only during specific windows, electoral trusts can take contributions all year round. The trusts forward the money which is donated to them to political parties. There is also a public record of who has contributed what to which electoral trust. While the electoral bonds scheme was introduced by the Narendra Modi government, the electoral trust scheme was brought by the Congress, in 2013, and also allows corporate houses to claim tax exemption through such donations. In February, ADR noted that the BJP received nearly Rs 857 crore – or 70% of the total donations received by all political parties – from electoral trusts in 2023-24.
