Many top electoral bond donors were under scanner of ED, I-T Department
Of bonds worth ₹1,368 crore purchased by Future Gaming and Hotel Services PR , 50% were purchased before ED searches and 50% after searches; other firms which followed a similar pattern are Keventer Food Park Infra Ltd., M.K.J. Enterprises Ltd., and Mad
An analysis of firms which feature among the top purchasers of electoral bonds throws up many curious patterns. One of the common links is that a significant number of companies in the top donor list were under the scanner of the Enforcement Directorate or the Income Tax (IT) Department at some point of time in the past five years. In some cases, these companies bought a chunk of the bonds in the days following such searches.
Future Gaming and Hotel Services PR was the largest donor to political parties through the electoral bond route, with a cumulative sum of ₹1,368 crore. In May 2023, the ED carried out searches at the residence of Santiago Martin, a wellknown lottery magnate and managing director of the company, in Chennai.
The ED also conducted searches at the business premises of the company in Coimbatore under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act (PMLA). A year earlier, on April 2, 2022, the ED attached movable assets worth ₹410 crore under the PMLA in a case of lottery scam against the company and its subsidiaries. Interestingly, five days later, on April 7, 2022, the company made a significant purchase of electoral bonds worth ₹100 crore, marking one of their largest transactions on a single date. Of the bonds worth ₹1,368 crore purchased by the company, 50% were purchased before the ED searches and 50% after the searches.
Same address
The other set of companies which followed a similar pattern are Keventer Food Park Infra Ltd., MKJ Enterprises Ltd., and Madanlal Ltd.
All these three firms are registered with the same address in Kolkata, West
Bengal, and have at least one common director.
The common director is Siddharth Gupta, but the three companies were incorporated in different years. MKJ Enterprises was incorporated in 1982, Madanlal in 1983, and Keventer Food Park was incorporated in 2010. These three companies together donated about ₹573 crore — the third highest — if purchases are considered cumulatively. Of the ₹573 crore, bonds worth ₹195 crore were purchased by Keventer Food Park Infra Ltd. in three batches between April and May 2019. Bonds worth about ₹185 crore were purchased by Madanlal Ltd. between May 8 and 10, 2019.
Stake sale
Keventer Agro, a company which shares its email domain with Madanlal and MKJ Enterprises, ran into controversy following a public interest litigation (PIL) petition filed by West Bengal Congress unit chief Adhir Ranjan Chowdhury after the State government’s sale of its stake in Metro
Dairy to Keventer Agro in 2017. The West Bengal government divested its 47% shares in Metro Dairy to Keventer Agro Ltd. for ₹85 crore in 2017. In the same year, a Singaporebased private equity fund picked up 15% shares of Keventer Agro for ₹170 crore. Currently, Mayank Jalan is the managing director of Keventer Agro and is also a director of Metro Dairy.
The ED started an investigation into the divestment of the West Bengal government’s stake in the Metro Dairy in 2019. Summons were issued to several officials of the State government, including H.K. Dwivedi, who was the State’s Finance Secretary in 2017, when the shares of Metro Dairy were divested. Summons were issued to State officials, including Mr. Dwivedi, in June 2020 and March 2021. In February 2021, searches were conducted by the ED officials at the office of Keventer Agro Ltd. in Kolkata in connection with the probe.
The investigation lost steam after the Calcutta High Court in June 2022 dismissed the PIL plea filed by Mr. Choudhury alleging lack of transparency in the divestment. The Supreme Court in September 2022 upheld the Calcutta High Court order.
The Yashoda Super Specialty Hospital Group in Hyderabad, whose premises were searched by the Income Tax Department in December 2020, donated ₹162 crore in multiple tranches beginning October 2021 and ending in October 2023.
Aurobindo Pharma’s director Sarath Reddy was arrested by the ED on November 10, 2022, for his alleged involvement in irregularities in the scrapped liquor policy of the Delhi government. Five days after the arrest on November 15, the company purchased bonds worth ₹5 crore. A year later, in November 2023, it purchased bonds worth ₹25 crore. In total, the company purchased electoral bonds worth ₹52 crore in multiple tranches between April 2021 and November 2023, of which ₹30 crore were done after Mr. Reddy’s arrest.
On December 18, 2023, IT searches were conducted on the factory premises of Shirdi Sai Electricals Ltd. at the Industrial Development Area on the outskirts of Kadapa.
Searches were also conducted simultaneously at the Hyderabad office and at residences of its top officials. The company purchased electoral bonds worth ₹40 crore on January 11, 2024. IT searches were conducted on the premises of real estate development firm Kalpataru Projects International and the residences of some of its directors and executives in August 2023. The company bought electoral bonds worth ₹25.5 crore between April 2023 and October 2023.
(With inputs from
Kunal Shankar and
Shiv Sahay Singh)