In total violation of the RTI Act, @PMOIndia refuses copy of files held by it regarding #PMCaresFund . PMO is a Public Authority under the RTI Act & cannot refuse records held by it even if it claims PMCares Fund does not come in the ambit of the transparency law. 1/n

RTI reveals that to accept CSR money, Ministry of Corporate Affairs stated that #PMCaresFund was set up by central govt. However to evade transparency, PMO says Fund is not a public authority, even though definition of ‘public authority’ under RTI includes body set up by govt 2/n

Intriguingly, after collecting CSR money for 2 months on grounds that #PMCaresFund was set up by Central govt, Companies Act was amended to explicitly include PMCares as being eligible for CSR funding. Was this done to claim that Fund is not a public authority under RTI Act? 3/n

RTI response shows that Cabinet did not discuss creation of #PMCaresFund
It is strange that a body with PM as ex officio Chairperson & 3 cabinet ministers (Home, Defence & Finance) as trustees in ex-officio capacity, did not go thru Cabinet. Who took decision to set up Fund? 4/n

#PMCaresFund website shows ₹2000 crore allocated for 50,000 ventilators. However RTI responses reveal that Ministry of Health placed orders from 6 companies of which 3 failed to clear clinical evaluations. Less than 18000 ventilators supplied till July 20 under the Fund. 5/n