New Delhi, May 21
The Enforcement Directorate (ED) has submitted a dossier with the union Home Ministry stating that Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) received Rs 7.08 crore as foreign funds from 2014 to 2022.
The ED has alleged that the same has led to violation of the Foreign Contribution Regulation Act (FCRA), the Representation of People Act (RPA) and the Indian Penal Code (IPC).
In its dossier, the ED told the Union Home Ministry that AAP received funds from multiple donors in countries, including the US, Canada, Australia, New Zealand, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Kuwait and Oman.
The ED shared all details with the Union Home Ministry relating to its investigations with details of donors, such as names of the donor, country of the donor, passport number, amount donated, mode of donation and bank account number of receiver, billing name, billing address, billing telephone numbers, billing e-mail, time and date of donation and payment gateway used, gathered during the investigation under Prevention of Money Laundering Act, 2002.
The ED submitted details of the e-mails exchanged between various AAP volunteers and functionaries, including Aniket Saxena (Coordinator of AAP Overseas India), Kumar Vishwas (then Convenor of AAP Overseas India), Kapil Bhardwaj (then AAP member) and Durgesh Pathak.
The investigations so far revealed that the amounts collected through fund-raising campaigns in the US and Canada and the identities of actual donors were concealed in the books of accounts maintained by the AAP to circumvent the restrictions imposed under FCRA on donations by foreign citizens to a political party. In addition to that, multiple donors used the same passport numbers, e-mail IDs, mobile numbers and credit cards to donate to AAP.
According to the ED, 155 people residing abroad made donations totalling Rs 1.02 crore on 404 occasions using 55 passport numbers. As many as 71 donors used 21 mobile numbers for making donations totalling Rs 99.90 lakh on 256 occasions, and 75 donors residing abroad used 15 credit cards for making donations totalling Rs 19.92 lakh on 148 occasions.
Donations through email IDs and mobile numbers of Canadian nationals' donations totalling Rs 51.15 lakh were received using e-mail IDs and mobile numbers of 19 Canadian nationals, whose identities were hidden, ED alleged.
During a fund-raising event organised by AAP in Canada in 2016, an e-mail conversation took place between Aniket Saxena (Coordinator of AAP Overseas India) and Kumar Vishwas (then Convenor of AAP Overseas India).Durgesh Pathak and Kapil Bhardwaj, then AAP member, had asked Aniket to transfer the donation amount of 29,000 Canadian dollars, collected during a fundraising programme, directly to Durgesh Pathak and Kapil Bhardwaj through one Bhagwant Toor.
During an event organised by AAP in Toronto on November 22, 2015, which was attended by Durgesh Pathak, 15,000 Canadian dollars were raised and handwritten raw data sheets containing details of donors and amounts donated were sent by party volunteers in Canada to AAP Overseas India through e-mail.
In another event organised by AAP in Toronto on January 30, 2016, a total donation of 11,786 Canadian dollars was collected, of which 3,821 Canadian dollars were used as expenses for organising the event, the ED added.
