HYDERABAD: Strange as it may sound, the TRS seems to have not ‘enjoyed as much patronage’ of the contributors over the years as it did in 2014. The party saw a slump in contributions it received between 2014-2015 and 2017-2018 as per the Annual Report of Contributions submitted to the election commission of India (ECI).
The party received `8.69 crore in 2014-2015 from 23 contributors. Interestingly, it is the highest contribution that the party received in the last five years. The amount it received during the years that followed reduced drastically. In 2015-2016, the party received just `76 lakh from three contributors. The contributions further decreased to `34.1 lakh in 2016-2017 from 23 contributors.
However, unlike in the other years, the contributors in 2016-2017 included names of TRS bigwigs.
Almost all of them were either Cabinet ministers, MLAs, MLCs, MPs or popular TRS leaders. Among the many names that featured include MLA T Harish Rao, MLC Palla Rajeshwar Reddy, former minister Nayini Narasimha Reddy, Home Minister Mohammad Mahmood Ali and MP P Srinivas Reddy. All of them have either contributed `1 lakh or `2 lakh to the party. Even contributions of `1 lakh each from the Konda Surekha and Konda Muralidhar Rao featured, who have later left the ranks of the party to join the Congress. However, in 2017-2018 the contributions increased marginally as 13 contributors gave `3.3 crore.
Highest contributors were
Ch Malla Reddy who is now an MLA in the TRS. Another major contribution is from Visaka Industries whose chairman is G Vivekanand and is expecting an MP ticket from Pedapalli constituency.
The two contributed `1 crore each. But one may wonder how the party is able to manage its widespread network across the State with such low amount of contributions. For the record, as per the annual audited account of the party in 2018-2019, the pink party has spent `10 crore for “administrative and general expenses”. It annually spends around `14 lakh on employment costs.
The answer seems to lie in the fact that the party receives its most funds through “annual fees/subscriptions from members.” As per the 2017-2018 financial audit report, the party received `22.9 crore in annual fees and subscriptions. The same was `24 crore in 2014-2015.