Congress leader Rahul Gandhi today hit out at the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) over a recent ADR report which showed that the saffron party’s political donations have gone up by 50 per cent in the last financial year.

According to the report by Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), the saffron party’s total income during 2019-20 was Rs 3,623.28 crore. It also said that the party spent Rs 1,651.022 crore or only 45.57 per cent during that period.

The ADR report also said that during the same period, the opposition Congress received Rs 682.21 crore as donations, five times less than the BJP but overshot its expenses by spending Rs 998.158 crore.

The report revealed that the BJP’s income rose by over 50 per cent or by Rs 1,213.20 crore between 2018-19 and 2019-20 from Rs 2,410.08 crore to Rs 3,623.28 crore. However, the Congress party’s income decreased by around 25 per cent from Rs 918.03 crore in 2018-19 to Rs 682.21 crore in 2019-20. Interestingly, it was Sharad Pawar’s NCP that registered highest increase in income by receiving Rs 85.583 crore during FY 19-20 as compared to Rs Rs 50.71 crore in FY 18-19. Thus, the NCP’s income increased by 68.77 per cent.

Notably, Rahul Gandhi has been targeting the Modi government over unemployment, inflation, COVID-19 vaccines and the dwindling economy. In a Twitter post made in July, Rahul Gandhi had attacked the Central government over a report which claimed that the majority of Indians were distressed due to inflation. “People are hopeless because there is a rule of tax collection in the country,” Gandhi had said.

In another Tweet, the former Congress president had criticised the government over a report of people selling their gold to overcome financial difficulties caused due to the COVID-19 pandemic. “Come rain or shine, no respite from GOI’s economic mess,” he had said.