Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) founder Abhijeet Dipke has questioned why the PM CARES Fund, whose corpus stood at ₹8,452.07 crore at the end of the 2024-25 financial year, is not being used to improve basic infrastructure in government schools.
Dipke’s remarks came after the latest audited statements of the Prime Minister’s Citizen Assistance and Relief in Emergency Situations (PM CARES) Fund showed that its corpus increased by 17.8% from ₹7,173.03 crore in 2023-24 to ₹8,452.07 crore in 2024-25.
‘Why are we not using this money for schools?’
In a video cited by Hindustan Times, Dipke said he had recently visited government schools in rural areas and found shortages of basic facilities, including drinking water. “They are struggling to get drinking water in schools. So why are we not using this money for those children's schools? Why is this money not being used to build new schools?” Dipke asked.
Dipke also questioned the contrast between reported funding shortages in government schools and the size of the PM CARES corpus. “So on one hand, it is being said that there are no funds for schools, and on the other hand, ₹8,500 crore is lying in the PM CARES Fund,” he highlighted.
He further said that the fund could potentially finance the construction of new schools if it were used for such infrastructure. “If one school costs ₹8 crore, then with ₹8,500 crore, more than 1,000 new high-tech model schools could have been built. But none of this is happening,” he said.
PM CARES Fund corpus rises to ₹8,452 crore
According to the latest audited statements, the PM CARES Fund closed 2024-25 with ₹8,452.07 crore, compared with ₹7,173.03 crore a year earlier.
The fund earned ₹469.38 crore in interest during the financial year and received ₹324.66 crore in refunds from implementing agencies. At the end of the year, ₹7,846.65 crore was held in fixed deposits and ₹605.41 crore in savings accounts.
Domestic donations, however, declined during the year. They fell from ₹681.81 crore in 2023-24 to ₹479.05 crore in 2024-25, while foreign donations declined from ₹1.14 crore to ₹0.93 crore.
Expenditure stood at ₹87.85 lakh
The audited statements show that expenditure from the fund during 2024-25 was ₹87.85 lakh.
Almost the entire amount — ₹87.84 lakh — was spent under the PM CARES for Children Scheme, while the remaining expenditure was ₹451 in bank and SMS charges.
The expenditure was sharply lower than the previous financial year, when ₹15.38 crore was spent under the PM CARES for Children Scheme.
