Under the Electoral Trusts (ET) Scheme, introduced by the UPA government in 2013 any company registered under Section 25 of the Companies Act, 1956, can form an electoral trust. These trusts are set up by companies with the objective to distribute the contributions received from other companies and individuals to the political parties.

Interestingly, as per the analysis of the contribution reports of the electoral trusts done by Delhi based Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR), highest donations to these trusts came from Telangana.

Notably, prudent trust that had received highest donations from corporates among the electoral trusts had donated majorly to BJP, parties from Telugu states, BRS and YSRCP. Notably, MEIL executed the Kaleshwaram Irrigation Project that had embroiled into controversy with the then opposition parties targeting the BRS government of large scale corruption.

MEIL’s donation also went to prudent trust. MEIL had made four donations of Rs 25 crore three times on July 5 and 6 in 2022 and Rs 12 crore on November 15 the same year.

Prudent trust received Rs 145.51crore in 13 donations from Telangana followed by Rs 105.25 crore in six donations from Maharashtra.

13 out of the 18 electoral trusts, registered with the Central Board of Direct Taxes (CBDT), submitted their contribution details for FY 2022-23 to the ECI of which only five declared to have received any donations during that year.

These five electoral trusts which have declared receiving contributions during FY 2022-23, have received a total amount of Rs 366.495 crore from corporates and individuals and distributed Rs 366.48 crore (99.996 per cent) to various political parties.

MIEL contributed the highest amount worth Rs 87 crore amongst all donors of the electoral trusts, followed by Serum Institute of India Pvt Ltd with Rs 50.25 crore and ArcelorMittal Nippon Steel India Ltd which contributed Rs 50 crore to various trusts.

Top 10 corporate donors have donated Rs 332.26 crore to electoral trusts, which forms 90.66 per cent of the total donations received by the trusts during FY 2022-23. All these 10 donors contributed to Prudent Electoral Trust.

Around 39 Corporate/Business Houses have contributed Rs 363.715 crore to electoral trusts in FY 2022-23. Of them 34 Corporate/Business Houses contributed Rs 360.46 crore to Prudent Electoral Trust, one company contributed Rs 2 crore to Samaj Electoral Trust, two companies contributed Rs 75.50 lakhs to Paribartan Electoral Trust and two companies contributed Rs 50 lakhs to Triumph Electoral Trust.

Prudent Electoral Trust donated to four political parties, including major parties like BJP, BRS, YSRCP and AAP. While BJP received Rs 259.08 crore or 70.69 per cent of the total donations received by all political parties from electoral trusts, BRS received Rs 90 crore or 24.56 per cent of the total donations received by all parties from all five electoral trusts YSRCP received Rs 16 crore and AAP Rs 90 lakhs from Prudent Trust.

ADR observed that the names of electoral trusts, currently, do not indicate the name of the company/group of companies which set up the trusts.

To have greater transparency regarding details of corporates which fund political parties, it would be ideal to include the name of the parent company in the name of the Electoral Trust, said ADR in its report released on Wednesday.