Source:
Date:
19.08.2015
City:
New Delhi
In what would be called a revealing report, election watchdog Association for Democratic reforms (ADR) has suggested that 79.68% of the income of five national political parties has come from unknown sources, for the financial year 2013-14.
The total income declared by Communist Party of India (Marxist), Congress, Bahujan Samaj Party, Nationalist Congress Party and Communist Party of India stands at Rs 844.71 crore.
Income from unknown sources amounts to Rs 673.08 crore, which is 79.68% of the total income of the national parties.
According to ADR, the income from unknown sources pertains to income declared in income tax returns, but without giving the source of income for donations below Rs 20,000. Such unknown sources also include sale of coupons, purse money, relief fund, miscellaneous income, voluntary contributions, contribution from meetings/morchas. The details of donors of such voluntary contributions are not available in the public domain.
ADR's estimation is based on income tax returns submission of the parties to the Election Commission of India (ECI).
If the ADR report is believed, the biggest political force in the country, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), is yet to fill in its IT returns detail, despite missing a deadline almost a year ago in Nov 2014. On 9th July 2015, the BJP asked for a four-week extension, but that has also lapsed.
ADR
57 per cent of the total income of five national parties during the financial year of 2013-14 was from sale of coupons. Indian National Congress (INC) has been the highest beneficiary from the sale of coupons, which earned it Rs 477.316 crore, while Nationalist Congress Party (NCP) collected Rs 8.32 crore.
Apart from details on income, political parties are also to file details of donations received.
A comparison of total donations declared by political outfits in their I-T returns (both above and below Rs 20,000) and that declared in the donations report shows that only 41% of the total donations of the parties came from voluntary contributions above Rs 20,000.
Also, the report says that an amount of Rs 111.29 crore (59%) of the total donations to national parties during financial year of 2013-14 were collected from donors whose details are not available in the public domain.
ADR
Congress recorded the highest income among the five parties, with a total income of Rs 598.06 crore, which forms 70.8% of the total income of all the national parties. CPM declared the second highest income of Rs 121.87 crore, which forms 14.43% of the total income of the national parties. These are followed by the BSP, NCP and CPI with Rs. 66.91 crore, Rs. 55.42 crore 2.43 crore respectively.
Indian National Congress has earlier protested against the ECI's directive issued in Nov 2014 that asked for filing the details of income tax returns, in order to promote transparent transactions.
However, the election watchdog insists that "those parties playing a decisive role at the national political arena should lead by example rather than curtailing any attempt at transparency."
