Prime Minister Narendra Modi

Chidambaram cries foul. Every other NGO or Trust is obliged to reveal the names of donors contributing more than a threshold amount. Why is this FUND exempt from this obligation, he asks

NEW DELHI – The PM-CARES Fund received Rs 3,076 crore in just five days between March 27 and March 31, reports NDTV quoting an audit statement made public by the government. Of this, only Rs 39.67 lakh was foreign contribution. The rest, Rs 3,075.85 crore came from domestic sources. The statement says PM-CARES had an initial corpus of ₹ 2.25 lakh and the fund has also received an interest of around ₹ 35 lakh.

But the government has not revealed the names of the domestic or foreign donors. The audit statement, uploaded on the PM-CARES fund website, is silent about the “accompanying notes 1 to 6”.

This has prompted former Finance Minister and senior congress leader P. Chidambaram to question government’s motive. Through a number of Tweets on Wednesday he has wanted to know as to why the names of “these generous donors” have not been revealed. “Why? Every other NGO or Trust is obliged to reveal the names of donors contributing more than a threshold amount. Why is the PM CARES FUND exempt from this obligation,” he asked. One of his Tweets reads:

PM-CARES or the Prime Minister’s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations Fund was set up by Prime Minister Narendra Modi in March to “deal with emergency or distress situations like the coronavirus pandemic”. It is managed by a trust with PM Modi as its chairperson and senior cabinet members as trustees.

Last month, the Supreme Court had said that the money collected under the PM-CARES Fund for the coronavirus pandemic need not be transferred to the National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF). It said that the funds collected by the PM-CARES Fund are those of charitable trusts and “entirely different”. The government is free to transfer money to the disaster response fund if it feels it is appropriate to do so, the top court said.

NDTV also reports that in June its request to the Prime Minister’s Office (PMO) was rejected. The television channel had through an RTI application had sought details of the PM-CARES Fund, including the trust deed. The PMO had said that the “Fund is not a public authority under RTI Act”.

But the audit statement has been signed by PMO officials on behalf of PM-CARES.

Shrikar K Pardeshi, Joint Secretary in the PMO, has signed the audit statement on behalf of PM-CARES Fund as “Secretary” while Gujarat cadre IAS Officer Hardik Shah, the Private Secretary to PM Modi, has signed the statement as Deputy Secretary of the Fund.