Congress Demands Probe Into Donations to BJP

Terming the donations collected by the Bharatiya Janata Party from electoral bonds were through ‘dubious donors,’ President of All India Congress Committee (AICC) Mallikarjun Kharge on Friday demanded an investigation of the highest level over donations to BJP while also pressing officials concerned to ‘freeze’ accounts of BJP since there is huge gap between donations collected by BJP and that of opposition parties.

As per the data released by State Bank of India on donations of political parties, Kharge said BJP got 50 percent while the Congress party got only 11 percent of donations and pondered how there can be such a huge difference in collection of donations among parties. The data released by SBI is an indication to “How BJP has made money out of electoral bonds” and with it, BJP stands exposed.

The AICC President held Prime Minister Narendra Modi responsible for the huge donations to BJP since he is the ‘main man’ and claims credit for everything that has happened in the country giving an impression to the people of the country that the country secured freedom only in 2014 (after Modi assumed charge as the Prime Minister).

Modi has never given credit to the BJP and always utters “Modi Ki Sarkar '' and “Modi Ki Guarantee,” said the President of the AICC at a press conference in Bengaluru along with AICC Treasurer Ajay Maken.

Kharge said that “Who are they (persons donated to BJP)?” and accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi of exerting pressure on persons facing Enforcement Directorate and Income Tax cases to donate to BJP and persons/leaders succumbed to the pressure and donated to the BJP.

While the leaders in opposition parties faced charges or faced allegations of corruption, the same leaders were given clean chit after joining BJP, the AICC president said. Not only these leaders who joined BJP under pressure, were given clean chit by the BJP regime, even posts were offered to them.

If not pressurised by BJP to give donations, Kharge felt that “Such a huge gap in donations wasn’t possible. Congress party pooled into donations through party workers, Members of Parliament and small donors. " While the accounts of Congress party with Rs 300 crore donations were frozen by Income Tax officials just when Lok Sabha elections were round the corner, Kharge said but BJP’s donations amounting to Rs 6,000 crores is available to BJP for operations. In such a situation, Kharge said “How can we face elections (Lok Sabha)?”

After Kharge, Rajya Sabha member Ajay Maken said the website of State Bank of India (SBI) does not mention anything about 3,346 electoral bonds which amounts to Rs 2,500 crore and questioned “Whom are Modi and SBI trying to shield?” The SBI website mentions 22, 217 electoral bonds out of which details are available for only 18,871 bonds.

Maken demanded an investigation into electoral bonds since data has been released on the directions of the Supreme Court and the investigation from SC should also cover IT and ED links to that of donations to the BJP.

While seeking freezing of BJP’s accounts, Maken pointed out that the Supreme Court has declared electoral bonds as “unconstitutional” and hence the BJP should not be allowed to use the money and stated “Why should BJP use electoral bonds when the Supreme Court has scrapped it?”