New Delhi: The Congress has hit out at the Modi government after a report claimed that government-run companies accounted for 60 per cent of the total donations made by NSE-listed firms to PM CARES.
Speaking at a press conference at the Congress headquarters here, party MP and spokesperson Abhishek Manu Singhvi said the fund lacked accountability and transparency, revealed a conflict of interest on the part of the government, and is “unconstitutional”.
“The controversies around the PM CARES fund prove that it has been set up by a highly uncaring government,” Singhvi added.
The Prime Minister’s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations or PM CARES fund was set up at the beginning of the Covid pandemic. According to its website, the fund “consists entirely of voluntary contributions from individuals/organisations and does not get any budgetary support”.
“The admitted fact is that government-run firms, government-owned firms and government-property firms have contributed an overwhelming percentage of all contributions to the PM CARES fund. In a three-year period from 2019 to 2022, these companies contributed just under 5,000 crores. Contributions of just under 60 per cent was through these government companies”, he added.
The top donors, he said, include the ONGC, NTPC, Power Grid Corporation, Indian Oil Corporation and the Power Finance Corporation.
“This raises serious conceptual issues of accountability, lack of transparency, clear conflict of interest and constitutional issues. This is a fund administered of the PM, by the PM and for the PMO,” he said.
He added: “It collects funds under the name and seal of the PM. It is advertised as exclusively public money. It utilises the enormous goodwill of the PMO and the PM. The so-called trustees apart from the PM are the defence minister, the home minister and finance minister. With all this, amazingly, it has no accountability. There is no CAG audit.
“If you, the nation, file an RTI enquiry, it has been argued by the government of India that this (PM CARES) is not a public authority.”
Singhvi said one of the reasons that the fund and the trust that runs it are kept out of these parameters is on the grounds that it does not receive any budgetary support.
“Now, look at the irony. You dis-apply things like CAG, RTI, government norms on the grounds that there is no budgetary support. And yet, government-owned and controlled companies, navratnas and miniratnas are the principal donors,” he said.
He also asked why the government did not make public the details of donations, expenditure and criteria for deployment of funds on its website, stating that it is “conflict of interest” if government-owned companies are donating to a government fund.
Speaking on the constitutionality of the funds, Singhvi asked if any government across the country could raise large sums of money on the name of the executive without any legislative sanction.
“Constitutional morality and decency does not require compulsion of law,” he said
“It’s been so many years, and no white paper has been released on the funds. You don’t do it every month, or every six months even, but for the sake of accountability and transparency, this is the least that can be done,” he added, calling it a “cruel joke on taxpayers”.
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