Despite the political heatwaves and aberrant developments, the Central government ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has become the richest political party in India as the Hindutva party has reportedly banked billions than its political rivals, the report published by the Association for Democratic reforms (ADR) reveal.
ADR, the Indian based non-governmental organization and think tank that works closely in the areas of electoral and political reforms, has released the report on the total incomes of the political parties in the financial year of 2018-19 in which the BJP has been rained with more assets on the heated political grounds. The reports say that the Central ruling party has raised Rs 2,410 crore as total income during 2018-19.
The ADR report has exposed that the income earned by the BJP is more than twice what the party's five major rivals earned in combined and it has been reported that the instrument of the electoral bonds has been aiding the parties to bag more income as about two-third of BJP's income -Rs 1,450 crore, was through the electoral bonds as the form of donations whereas BJP's main rival Indian National Congress had earned Rs 918 crore as total income, of which Rs 383 crore was from the electoral bonds.
Out of six national parties, only BJP, Congress, and Trinamool Congress have disclosed that the parties had banked income from the donations and contributions through electoral bonds and the trio has reported with a total of Rs 1,931 crore that was raised through the bonds. West Bengal ruling Trinamool Congress has earned Rs 192.65 crore in total while the Marxist Communist party India had drawn Rs 100.96 crore as total income during the FY whereas the Bahujan Samaj Party had raised Rs 69.79 crore in the same period.
In 2017-18, the BJP has declared with Rs 1,027 crore as its total earnings that had seen a skyrocketing rise in the succeeding year of 2018-19 with Rs 2,410 crore and despite being the opposition, the Congress party's income stood at Rs 199.15 crore in 2017-18 that was now elevated to Rs 918.03 crore. The ADR report has revealed that the BJP and the Congress have spent Rs 792.39 crore and Rs 308.96 crore respectively in the financial year and the expenses incurred were mainly for the elections.
The Indian political parties have been raining with assets and incomes after the Central government had introduced the electoral bonds in 2017. The bonds can be purchased by an individual at the selected branches of the government-owned State Bank of India after which they would be delivered to a political party that can exchange them for cash and the reports say the bonds won't list out the names of the donors. These bonds have become the banking instrument for the individuals and the corporations to contribute to the political parties by upholding the anonymity. Although the issues, controversies, and allegations have been queueing up against the BJP, the party has been bagging more incomes since it came to power in 2014.
