PM CARES Controversy: ₹8,453 Crore Idle – A Failure of Accountability?

The latest figures surrounding the PM CARES Fund have triggered a fresh debate over transparency, accountability and the use of public contributions. According to the recently released audited statements, the fund’s closing balance stood at around ₹8,452 crore as of March 31, 2025, while expenditure during 2024–25 was only about ₹87.85 lakh.

The controversy becomes even sharper because PM CARES was created in March 2020 during the COVID-19 crisis, when citizens and organisations contributed money with the expectation that it would be used during emergencies. The government had also announced major spending from the fund for medical infrastructure, including PSA oxygen-generation plants intended to strengthen hospitals during the pandemic.

However, subsequent audits have revealed problems with the utilisation of some of these assets. A CAG report found that more than half of the COVID-era PSA oxygen plants installed through PM CARES and CSR initiatives in West Bengal were either uncommissioned or non-functional as of December 2023.

This raises a serious political question for the Narendra Modi government: if thousands of crores remain accumulated while emergency infrastructure can remain unused, where is the accountability?

Calling this outright “cheating with common people’s money” would require evidence of deliberate deception or financial wrongdoing. But critics can reasonably argue that inadequate utilisation and limited transparency represent a serious failure of public accountability. The fund’s statements were also released after a two-year gap, adding to questions about transparency.

For the Modi government, this is therefore not merely an accounting issue. It is a test of whether money collected in the name of citizens’ emergencies is being deployed effectively when people actually need it.

The real question is simple: if citizens donated for emergencies, shouldn’t every rupee be transparently accounted for—and used when the emergency demands it?