According to the Association of DemocratcReforms (ADR) and National Election Watch (NEW), while Timblo donated Rs.1.18 crore to the BJP and Rs.65 lakh to the Congress from 2004-12, Lodhia donated Rs.51,000 to the BJP.
After the central government released the eight names of foreign bank account holders who were being probed by the Income Tax department for irregularities and illegalities, the opposition made snarly comments about holding back other names, including that of politicians, from the list of 700 names.
As Finance Minister Arun Jaitly said, more disclosures will be done if and only after the government finds evidence of illegality in any of the 700 accounts whose details were handed over to it by French and German authorities.
The names that were disclosed included name of Dabur India promoter Pradip Burman, bullion trader Pankaj Chamanlal Lodhiya, Goa mining company Timblo Private Ltd and five of its directors — Radha Satish Timblo, Chetan S Timblo, Rohan S Timblo, Anna C Timblo and Mallika R Timblo.
The Supreme Court was told by the central government through affidavit that the information on Burman had been secured from the French, while on others the sources were “other countries”.
India has no official estimates of illegal money stashed away overseas. But the unofficial ones range from $466 billion to $1.4 trillion.
Interestingly, and reportedly, Radha Timblo and Lodhia have donated money to the BJP and Congress, according to watchdog NGOs.
According to the Association of Democratic Reforms (ADR) and National Election Watch (NEW), while Timblo donated Rs.1.18 crore to the BJP and Rs.65 lakh to the Congress from 2004-12, Lodhia donated Rs.51,000 to the BJP.
The details of the donations made by the companies were sourced from the list of political donations listed on the Election Commission’s web site.
Agencies reported that according to the ADR-NEW statement, there are a total of 13 electoral Trusts, only seven of which have been approved by the Central Bureau of Direct Taxes (CBDT) because they were formed after the CBDT rules governing electoral trusts were notified Jan 31, 2013.
The seven trusts formed after the CBDT rules came into effect are required to submit details of their donations to the Election Commission.
The remaining six formed before the CBDT rules came into existence are not required to do so. These six trusts have donated more than Rs 105 crore to national parties between 2004-05 and 2011-12. Details of these donations are not known.
Timblo Pvt Ltd is one of the many mining companies accused of carrying out illegal mining by the Justice M.B. Shah commission, which exposed a Rs.35,000 crore illegal mining scam in the state.
But if that is the case, where BJP government revealed the name despite big donations to it by the accused, it says a lot about the party’s conviction towards bringing black money back.
