New Delhi, 20 August (H.S.): Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge has called for greater transparency and public accountability in the PM CARES Fund. Citing figures available on the fund's official website, he said that the PM CARES Fund had a closing balance of Rs 8,452 crore at the end of the 2024-25 financial year, while only Rs 87.85 lakh was spent during the same period, amounting to approximately 0.01 per cent of the fund's closing balance.

In a post on social media platform X on Thursday, Kharge questioned why a fund bearing the Prime Minister's name remains outside the normal mechanisms of public scrutiny. He asked what justified maintaining thousands of crores of rupees in an emergency fund when only 0.01 per cent of its closing balance was utilised in a year.

Kharge noted that the Prime Minister serves as the chairperson of the PM CARES Fund, while the Defence Minister, Home Minister and Finance Minister act as its trustees. He further pointed out that the fund receives contributions under Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) provisions and is also eligible for tax-deductible donations. Despite this, he questioned why the fund remains outside the purview of the Right to Information Act, scrutiny by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG), and parliamentary oversight.

The Congress president posed two specific questions to the Prime Minister. First, he asked why a fund associated with the Prime Minister's office is exempt from conventional public accountability mechanisms. Second, he questioned the rationale behind maintaining an emergency fund worth thousands of crores when only 0.01 per cent of its closing balance was spent during 2024-25.

Kharge said the Prime Minister should respond to concerns regarding the PM CARES Fund and its public accountability framework. He also called for greater transparency regarding the fund's corpus, its utilisation and the mechanisms governing its oversight.

According to the audited accounts for 2024-25 published on the official PM CARES Fund website, the fund began in 2020 with a corpus of just Rs 2.25 lakh and had accumulated Rs 8,452 crore by March 31, 2025.

The audit report stated that during the 2024-25 financial year, the fund received Rs 479.04 crore in donations from within India and approximately Rs 92 lakh from overseas contributors. In addition, it earned Rs 475.14 crore in interest income, including Rs 469.37 crore from fixed deposits and Rs 5.76 crore from bank accounts.

The report further noted that Rs 324.65 crore was returned to the fund as refunds from amounts previously allocated to various projects. However, the audit details did not specify the names of the agencies involved or the reasons for the refunds. The fund also received Rs 13.49 lakh as a Tax Deducted at Source (TDS) refund.

According to the audited accounts, nearly 93 per cent of the fund's total corpus, amounting to Rs 7,846 crore, is invested in fixed deposits. During the 2024-25 financial year, the fund's total expenditure stood at only Rs 87.85 lakh.

---------------

Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar