New Delhi: Three political parties – BJP, BRS and Congress – were the biggest beneficiaries of donations by the pharma and healthcare industry made through electrical bonds, cornering over 95% of the funds, according to data disclosed by State Bank of India.
It showed BJP received donations of over Rs 420 crore from the sector, with Ahmedabad-based Torrent Pharmaceuticals (Rs 62 crore) emerging as the top industry donor, followed by Cipla (Rs 36 crore) and Aurobindo Pharma (34.5 crore), among others.
TOI looked at contributions of over Rs 50 lakh for this story.
One of the directors of Aurobindo Pharma, Sarath Reddy, was arrested by Enforcement Directorate for being part of the cartel of liquor traders, the so-called South Group, which benefited from Delhi’s excise scam.
Reddy, who was accused of being an accomplice of former Telangana CM K Chandrasekhar Rao’s daughter, Kavitha, later turned an approver in the case.
BRS in Telangana was the second biggest recipient with Rs 311 crore donations from the healthcare and pharma sector. Its kitty was 26% lower than BJP. Yashoda Super-specialty hospital, a Hyderabad-based hospital chain, donated maximum Rs 94 crore to the Telangana-based party, followed by Hetero Drugs and Hetero Labs (Rs 50 crore) and Dr Reddy’s Lab (Rs 32 crore).
Yashoda had earlier denied that it had used electoral bonds, which are now defunct, to make political donations.
Congress received Rs 123 crore from the pharmaceutical and healthcare industry with Yashoda Super-specialty hospital donating maximum Rs 64 crore, followed by Dr Reddy’s Lab (Rs 14 crore), and NATCO Pharma (Rs 12.3 crore).
TDP in Andhra Pradesh received donations worth Rs 27 crore from the pharma majors while YSR Congress Party from the state received donations worth Rs 4 crore and AAP, which is in power in Delhi and Punjab, received Rs 2 crore from leading companies.
Spokespersons of leading pharmaceutical companies did not comment on the details of their contributions uploaded by Election Commission or the allegations that they had been coerced into making the contributions by the political parties.