The Tata Group became the biggest donor, with all its firms combined having donated Rs 758 crore to the BJP in the run-up to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, and with political donations of all the groups combined coming to nearly Rs 915 crore in 2024-’25, interestingly, the contribution came just weeks after the conglomerate secured Union Cabinet approval to build two semiconductor units with half of the project cost underwritten by the Centre through subsidies amounting to Rs 44,203 crore.
The approval granted on 29 February 2024 formed part of the government’s wider push to create a domestic semiconductor ecosystem, and the Tata Group emerged as the most significant beneficiary as it received permission to set up two units in Gujarat and Assam while the Centre agreed to shoulder 50% of the capital expenditure under the India Semiconductor Mission, according to a Scroll.in report.
The subsequent flow of political funding from 15 Tata companies through the Progressive electoral trust, therefore, drew attention, and the timing appeared to align closely with the substantial state support extended for the group’s ambitious semiconductor expansion.
The trust transferred Rs 914.9 crore to ten political parties on 2 April 2024, and the BJP became the largest recipient with Rs 757.6 crore, while the Congress obtained Rs 77.3 crore, and eight regional parties received Rs 10 crore each, and the significant scale of this distribution stood out because the trust had remained inactive between 2021 and 2024.
The resumption of donations in a year marked by both large public subsidies and general elections added to the scrutiny, and the recorded date of October 2025 in its filings was later attributed by the trust to a system glitch in the Election Commission’s portal.
The Tata contribution formed part of a broader trend in which corporations receiving government incentives for semiconductor ventures channelled large sums to the BJP, and the Murugappa Group, which received approval for a unit in Tamil Nadu with half its Rs 7,000-crore cost supported by Rs 3,501 crore in central subsidy, donated Rs 125 crore to the party soon after the sanction.
The pattern extended further as Kaynes Technology’s managing director contributed Rs 12 crore to the BJP in 2023-24 while his firm, Kaynes Semicon Private Limited, won approval in September 2024 to establish a semiconductor plant in Sanand, Gujarat, and these linkages reinforced perceptions of a convergence between state-supported industrial expansion and political financing.
The Modi government’s semiconductor mission, which emerged after pandemic-induced supply chain disruptions exposed India’s dependence on imported chips, offered extensive central and state incentives to firms entering this sector, and the Tata Group’s long-term strategic interest in semiconductors aligned neatly with this policy framework as it secured partnerships with global manufacturers and prepared to invest Rs 1.18 lakh crore across its approved units.