Analysis of donations from Corporates & Business Houses to National political parties during FY 2019-20
(Known donations above Rs 20,000 only)
For the complete report in English and the summary in Hindi, containing sector-wise in-depth analysis of donations received by National Parties between FY 2019-20, kindly refer to the attached reports.
Link on the website: https://adrindia.org/content/analysis-donations-corporates-business-hou…
Introduction
Political parties are required to submit details of donors who have made donations above Rs 20,000 in a financial year (between 1st April and 31st March) to the Election Commission of India, every year. Parties provide details of the name, address, PAN, mode of payment and amount contributed by each donor who has made a donation above Rs 20,000 in their submission.
Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR), in its report dated 8th January, 2014, specified that various sectors of business houses in 8 years, between FY 2004-05 & 2011-12, donated a total of Rs 378.89 cr to National parties, constituting 87% of the total contribution from known sources of political parties.
In the report dated 18th August, 2017, ADR specified that various sectors of business houses in 4 years, between FY 2012-13 & 2015-16, donated a total of Rs 956.77 cr to National parties, constituting 89% of the total contribution from known sources of political parties.
ADR analysed (report dated July 9, 2019) the donations from corporates to National parties between FY 2016-17 and 2017-18. During this period, the various sectors of business houses donated a total of Rs 985.18 cr, constituting 93% of the total contribution to political parties from known sources.
ADR had analysed (report dated November 20, 2020) the donations from corporate to National parties during FY 2018-19, during this period the various sectors of business houses donated a total of Rs 881.26 cr (93%) donations to National parties from Known sources.
This report analyses the donations from corporates (above Rs 20,000) to National parties for the FY 2019-20.
Political parties considered in this report are BJP, INC, NCP, CPM & AITC. Though a National party, BSP has not been considered for analysis in this report as the party has declared that it received no voluntary contributions above Rs 20,000 from any donor during this period as well as during the time period since 2004. CPI did not declare any income from corporates for FY 2019-20 and hence has not been taken up for analysis for this period.
It is seen from the analysis that during the FY 2019-20, a total of Rs 921.95 cr was donated by all the corporate/business houses to the 5 National parties during FY 2019-20, constituting 91% of the total contribution to political parties from known sources. Donations from corporates to National parties increased by 143% from the period between 2004-12 to 2019-20.
Please note that the data on corporate donations declared by AITC has been considered as part of this report since 2016 only – when the party was recognised as a National party.
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Executive Summary
Donations from Corporates/business houses
Out of 5 National parties, BJP received the maximum donations of Rs 720.407 cr from 2025 corporate donors followed by INC which received a total contribution of Rs 133.04 cr from 154 corporate donors, and NCP with Rs 57.086 cr from 36 corporate donors.
During FY 2019-20, the voluntary contributions above Rs 20,000 from corporate/business houses of INC, NCP and BJP are 96%, 95% and 92% respectively.
CPI declared no income from corporate donations for FY 2019-20.
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Year-wise corporate donations to National Parties
National parties have received the maximum corporate donations of Rs 921.95 cr in the FY 2019-20 (during which the 17th Lok Sabha elections were held), followed by Rs 881.26 cr in the FY 2018-19 and Rs 573.18 cr in the FY 2014-15 (during which the 16th Lok Sabha elections were held).
Corporate donations received in FY 2019-20 constituted 24.62% of the total corporate donations received between FY 2012-13 and 2019-20.
Between FY 2012-13 and 2019-20, donations from corporates to National parties increased by 1024%, with a drop in the percentage of corporate donations in FY 2015-16.
Donations from corporates to National parties increased by 109% between FY 2017-18 and 2018-19.
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Top corporate donors to National Parties
Prudent Electoral Trust was the top donor to two of the National parties namely BJP and INC in the FY 2019-20. The Trust donated 38 times in a single year to the two parties each, amounting to a total of Rs 247.75 cr.
BJP declared receiving Rs 216.75 cr and INC was the recipient of Rs 31.00 cr from Prudent Electoral Trust.
B.G. Shirke Construction Technology Pvt. Ltd. was the top donor to NCP in FY 2019-20.
Details of top 10 donors to the 5 National Parties for FY 2019-20 are given in Annexure – 1.
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Categorization of donors based on their type of business
The contributions from corporate/business houses have been divided into 15 sectors/categories by ADR and do not form a part of the submission by parties to ECI. The sectors include Trusts & Group of companies; Manufacturing; Power & Oil; Mining, Construction, Exports/Imports; and Real Estate among others.
Out of the total of Rs 921.95 cr donated by the corporate/ business houses to the 5 National parties in FY 2019-20, Rs 22.312 cr was received from the unsegregated category, which includes companies with no details available online or whose nature of work is unclear.
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Sectors with top donations to political parties
During the FY 2019-20, Electoral Trusts were the biggest donors to the National parties, contributing a total amount of Rs 397.82 cr (a share of 43.15%).
The Manufacturing sector was the second highest overall contributor in FY 2019-20, contributing a total amount of Rs 146.388 cr. While in the FY 2018-19 also, the Manufacturing sector was the second highest overall contributor with Rs 96.88 cr.
During FY 2019-20, BJP, INC, AITC and NCP received the maximum contributions from Electoral Trusts. BJP received the highest, Rs 323.32 cr, followed by INC with Rs 71.00 cr, AITC with Rs 2.00 cr and NCP with Rs 1.50 cr.
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Donations without PAN details and address
A total of 309 donations through which National parties received Rs 10.555 cr do not have address details in the contribution form.
National parties have received Rs 13.91 cr from 144 donations which do not have PAN details in the contribution form.
Rs 16.19 cr or 99.85% of such donations without PAN as well as address details worth Rs 16.215. cr belongs to the BJP.
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Unsegregated Donations
5 National parties reported receiving 495 donations amounting to Rs 22.312 cr from corporate entities which have zero internet presence or if they do there is ambiguity about the nature of their work.
Contact and address details of most of these companies were unavailable in cases where they were visible online.
Such contributions have not been segregated into different sectors due to incomplete information.
Recommendations
The Supreme Court gave a judgment on 13-09-2013, declaring that no part of a candidate affidavit should be left blank. Similarly, no part of the Form 24A submitted by political parties providing details of donations above Rs 20,000, should be blank.
All donors who have donated a minimum of Rs 20,000 as a single or multiple donations should provide their PAN details.
Date on which the donation was made should be recorded by the party and submitted in Form 24A.
Any party which does not submit its donation statement to the ECI on or before 31st October should be heavily penalized and its income should not be tax-exempted.
A total of Rs 16.215 cr was collected by the National parties from 310 corporate donors without obtaining their PAN and Address details. Such incomplete contributions reports must be returned to the parties by the ECI, to deter them from providing incomplete information.
Corporates should make details of their political contributions available in public domain through their websites (in annual reports or on a dedicated page) for increasing transparency in political financing.
Annual scrutiny of donations reports of National, Regional and unrecognized parties should be initiated by a dedicated department of the CBDT, to discourage donations from shell companies or illegal entities.