Rs 2 crore funding scam, AAP goes to SC and more: Delhi polls just got dirtier

Allegations that AAP received ‘dubious funding’ to the tune of Rs 2 crore from four ‘fake’ companies that do not exist capped an already dramatic Monday, which had seen AAP take on BJP over a ‘casteist’ political advertisement and the resignation of one of BJP CM candidate Kiran Bedi’s campaign coordinators. The allegations, which strike at the heart of AAP’s ideology of clean and transparent politics, made by a breakaway faction of the Aam Aadmi Party, calling itself the AAP Volunteer Action Manch (AVAM) created a furore in Delhi. What AVAM effectively said, was that AAP had received four donations of Rs 50 lakh each from four questionable companies, Goldmine Buildcon, Skyline Metal and Alloys, Infolance Software Solutions and Sunvision Agencies. [caption id=“attachment_2076421” align=“alignleft” width=“380”] PTI[/caption] “We have four transaction IDs under which donations of Rs 50 lakh each were made by four companies at 12am on April 5, 2014. The companies have fake addresses, a common set of directors and no business at all. They do not buy or sell anything. They make no money and only pay auditors", AVAM representative Gopal Goel said at a press conference on Monday, in which it presented its claims. Goel added that all four companies had fake addresses and there was no record of any actual business operation. “In fact, there has never been more than Rs 25,000 in their accounts at any point of time. This is a case of organized money laundering", he added. According to a report in the Times of India , the charge of fake addresses appear to be substantiated. TOI said, “Reporters tried to track down one Hem Prakash Sharma, a director in three of the four companies. The listed address of D-276 Ganga Vihar was false. The inhabitants there said they were living in the house for the past 20 years and Hem Prakash Sharma never lived there.” Additionally, the Indian Express sent out reporters to the listed addresses of all four companies. They reportedly found a sewing shop, a shut down grocery, and a post office at the listed addresses. The Express also looked into the official records of all four companies, which showed dubious financial records. Here’s what it found: * Infolance, in its last filing, listed a cash reserve of Rs 50 crore and total operational expenses of Rs 22,077 but no revenue for the financial year ended March 31, 2013 * Goldmine Buildcon’s balance sheet for the financial year ending March 31, 2013 shows that the company’s shares were sold at a premium of Rs 500, while recording a nominal profit of Rs 61,237 * Sunvision Agencies has earned Rs 94.95 lakh by offloading shares at a premium * Skyline Metal and alloys offloaded its shares at a premium to unknown investors at Rs 1.57 crore The BJP and Congress were quick to capitalise on the charges. “How have companies which made no profits/remained dormant contributed substantial sums to the AAP? Why have these companies donated same amount at the same time? Were these shell companies used for money-laundering,’’ Union Ministers Piyush Goyal and Nirmala Sitharaman asked at a press conference in Delhi. Former AAP member Shazia Ilmi went one step further describing the entire operation as “Hawala at Midnight”. The BJP has also taken out an advertisement in Tuesday’s Delhi newspapers, depicting a muffler clad Kejriwal helping criminals to launder black money:

AAP meanwhile is not taking the allegations lying down. “We’ve taken all donations by cheque. If the companies raised that money through some sort of violations, then how are we responsible for that?” Kejriwal asked during a townhall show with the NDTV news channel. Meanwhile, AAP leader Yogendra Yadav said the party had taken all donations through cheques to ensure transparency, and also insisted on PAN card details for the transactions. “We are ready for a probe by any agency of the Central government… AAP uploads its donation record through a software which uses a batch technique…All cheque donations post realisation in banks are uploaded on the website in a batch process during night hours, therefore, the malicious campaign about transactions at midnight is completely incorrect,” Kejriwal added. Subsequently the party has said it will approach the Supreme Court later on Tuesday morning to demand a SIT probe into the funding of all three major political parties - Congress, BJP and AAP. It also challenged the BJP to a public debate to discuss sources of funding.

This is not the first time that questions have been raised against the source of AAP’s funding. Earlier, right before the previous Delhi polls, a petition was filed in the Delhi High Court on 9 October, 2013 seeking the registration of a criminal case against AAP leader Arvind Kejriwal for allegedly accepting foreign funds in violation of the law. The court had directed the central government to go through details of the money donated to the AAP since its inception on 26 November, 2012 and to take action if anything was found in violation of the FCRA. The plea had named Kejriwal, advocates Shanti Bhushan and Prashant Bhushan and party member Manish Sisodia. AAP had told the court that it was the only party whose financial records and other details were open for public viewing and it got donations amounting to Rs 30 crore from Indian citizens solely, out of which Rs 8.5 crore came from NRIs. The Centre on 7 May, 2014 told the Delhi High Court that while a probe into the foreign funding received by the AAP was underway, donations received by the party from Indians living abroad was not in violation of the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA). The then UPA government had told the court that eight people with foreign addresses made donations to Aam Aadmi Party (AAP). Their passport numbers as mentioned in the contribution report of Election Commission were checked and it was found that they possess Indian passports and NRIs holding Indian passports are not foreign sources, it added. “This is for the second time in seven months that successive central governments have rejected the baseless allegation of foreign donations to the AAP,” a party spokesperson said at the time. AAP in December had threatened to take legal action against the Delhi unit of the Bharatiya Janata Party over its allegations that AAP was receiving foreign funding. With successive opinion polls indicating that AAP is headed towards a majority in Delhi, the allegations by AVAM are fortuitously timed for the BJP in particular. The fact that according to TOI, “the AVAM team making the disclosure had a person by the name of Neil Terrance Haslam, who, said sources in the BJP, is in talks with the party to join it” will give AAP a platform on which to claim victimisation. So will this be the fillip the BJP needs to pull off a last minute poll miracle, or will this be seen as yet another ‘dirty trick’ by the big boys in power to keep a fledgling political party out of power? The answer depends on how much meat there is to the AVAM claims. Hard evidence uncovered by the media will make for damaging headlines in the critical last week of campaigning. But without the same, AAP will likely be able to change the subject with counter-allegations of its own.