PM cares?
- 7 hours ago
- 4 min read
The secrecy surrounding the fund and its contributors is puzzling. If the money it receives is being used for public relief, why is there a need for secrecy?
Independent Ink Editorial
When the PM CARES Fund was launched on March 27, 2020, no one questioned its noble intent. The nation was facing the Covid-19 crisis, and the government required financial support from both the private and public sectors, as well as generous citizens, to navigate through the devastating impact of the pandemic.
Citizens, film stars, corporate entities, and public sector undertakings (PSUs) stepped forward to make donations. Notably, the Russian state-owned defense exports company, Rosoboronexport, reportedly contributed a total of $2 million to the fund. According to the PM CARES website, within weeks of its launch, voluntary contributions reached ₹3,075.85 crore.
The significant influx of funds raised concerns about their utilisation. This was to be expected since the fund was reportedly established as "a public charitable trust." However, RTI activists quickly discovered that there was very little transparency regarding its operations, particularly concerning its funding and finances.
In December 2020, eight months after its creation, it was officially disclosed that the Fund operated as a "private entity." Despite this status, it utilised the national emblem and government resources for its operations.
This classification as a "private" entity allowed it to avoid scrutiny from RTI queries, parliamentary oversight, and audits by the Comptroller and Auditor General (CAG).
The secrecy surrounding the fund and its contributors is puzzling. If the money it receives is being used for public relief, why is there a need for secrecy?
Does the fund have a special status due to the high-profile representation from the Union cabinet on its board?
Its chair is Prime Minister Narendra Modi, and it includes the defence minister, home minister, and finance minister as ex-officio members. The identities of the other trustees are not publicly known, although reports suggest that several prominent citizens and business leaders are among them.
Recent public interest in the Fund has been sparked by a selective excerpt from its auditors' report released last fortnight in august, 2026. The report has revealed that at the end of the 2024-25 fiscal year, the PM CARES Fund had a corpus of ₹8,452 crore.
Only ₹88 lakh was spent on relief measures. Besides, an amount of ₹6,641 crore has been placed in fixed deposits, which has earned the Fund ₹469 crore as interest -- during the same fiscal year.
Why was this money left unused?
Were there not enough disasters, including floods and natural calamities across the country, that should have urged the trustees to loosen the Fund’s purse strings?
Questions about the PMCARES fund often receive typical responses from its apologists. They claim that the funds are being kept in reserve to address emergencies, such as the Covid pandemic, or that the National Disaster Response Fund (NDRF) is available to manage floods and other natural disasters.
There is still no satisfactory explanation for the lack of transparency regarding the Fund's accounts. Surely, ledgers must exist that detail the inflow and outflow of funds amounting to thousands of crores.
Why has PMCARES been so secretive about this information?
Is there something it is trying to conceal?
So where have the monies come from?
There is no official list of contributory donations, but press reports from 2020-2021, particularly reports by Shyamlal Yadav of The Indian Express, give us a clue. But they still do not explain the secrecy surrounding PMCARES' financials.
News reports from that period, compiled by analyzing annual reports and other documents, indicate that Reliance Industries and the Tata Group each contributed Rs 500 crore. Additionally, Adani Enterprises Limited contributed Rs 100 crore, while three leading private sector banks—ICICI Bank (Rs 80 crore), HDFC Bank (Rs 70 crore), and Kotak Mahindra Bank (Rs 25 crore)—together contributed Rs 175 crore.
Not just corporate houses and private banks, the three branches of the defence services—army, navy, and air force—donated Rs 203.67 crore from a day’s salary of their personnel, according to official figures released in 2020.
According to a report in the Indian Express, 38 public sector undertakings (PSUs) contributed a total of Rs 2,105 crore from their Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) funds. Additionally, Navodaya schools, IITs, IIMs, and central universities collectively contributed Rs 21.81 crore.
The list is not exhaustive and does not cover the six years the Fund has been in existence. Several other businesses, from the pharma industry to PSU banks, have reportedly made significant contributions about which we are in the dark. Suffice to say, several organisations and individuals donated liberally to the fund, and as citizens we have the right to know how these funds were utilised and who the recipients of the money were.
A comprehensive forensic audit of the PMCARES accounts over the past six years can clarify the situation, and its findings should be made public. If the fund, indeed, has a noble intent, then there should be no need for secrecy.