In the first full year after the Supreme Court scrapped electoral bonds, political parties have reported a sharp rise in declared corporate and trust-linked donations. The Tata group–controlled Progressive Electoral Trust (PET) accounted for the most substantial inflows. Of the total ₹915 crore routed through PET in 2024–25, the BJP received ₹757.6 crore, nearly 83% of the trust’s disbursals.
Other contributions to the BJP included ₹150 crore from New Democratic Electoral Trust, over ₹30.1 crore from Harmony ET, ₹21 crore from Triumph ET, ₹9.5 lakh from Jan Kalyan ET, and ₹7.75 lakh from Einzigartig ET, taking its total receipts from electoral trusts to around ₹959 crore. In comparison, in the 2018–19 Lok Sabha election year, PET disbursed ₹454 crore, of which 75% went to the BJP.
Congress received ₹77.3 crore from PET, ₹5 crore from New Democratic ET, and ₹9.5 lakh from Jan Kalyan ET in 2024–25. Prudent Electoral Trust contributed ₹216.33 crore and AB General ET ₹15 crore, meaning Congress secured over ₹313 crore of its total ₹517.37 crore contributions through the trust route. Congress’s declared contributions this year are higher than the ₹281.48 crore it received in 2023–24, when electoral bonds were still in force, but significantly below its ₹828 crore bond income last year.
Trust-backed donations to Trinamool Congress (TMC) stood at ₹153.5 crore of its total ₹184.96 crore receipts in 2024–25, sharply lower than the ₹612 crore it received via bonds in 2023–24. BJD, which had received ₹245.5 crore in bonds last year, reported ₹60 crore this year, including ₹35 crore from trusts. Bharat Rashtra Samithi’s (BRS) trust contributions dipped to ₹15 crore from ₹85 crore in 2023–24. PET also disbursed ₹10 crore each to TMC, YSR Congress Party, Shiv Sena, BJD, Bharat Rashtra Samithi, JDU, DMK, and LJP (Ram Vilas). Triumph disbursed ₹21 crore to BJP and ₹4 crore to TDP, while Harmony ET gave ₹30.1 crore to BJP, ₹3 crore to Shiv Sena-UBT, and ₹2 crore to NCP-Sharad Pawar.
The AAP reported ₹38.10 crore in contributions, an increase from ₹11.06 crore in 2023–24, including ₹2 crore from Samaj ET, ₹5 crore from Prudent ET, and ₹10 crore from PET. YSR Congress Party declared ₹140 crore, down from ₹184 crore last year. The Telugu Desam Party reported ₹83.04 crore, including ₹25 crore from Prudent ET and ₹5 crore from AB General ET.
Tata Group companies donating to PET this year included Tata Sons Pvt Ltd (₹308 crore), TCS (₹217.6 crore), Tata Steel (₹173 crore), Tata Motors (₹49.4 crore), Tata Power (₹39.5 crore), Tata Communications (₹14.8 crore), and Tata Consumer Products, Tata Elxsi and Tata Autocomp Systems (₹19.7 crore each). Among other trusts, the Mahindra-backed New Democratic ET donated ₹160 crore, of which ₹150 crore went to the BJP.
Electoral bonds, introduced in 2018 as a major opaque funding channel, were struck down by the Supreme Court in February 2024 for lacking transparency. The 2024–25 disclosures mark the structural shift towards trusts as high-value donation vehicles for national and regional parties in the post-bond era.
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