Alleged journalist Rana Ayyub recently issued a statement in connection to the seize of funds by Enforcement Directorate and accepted almost all the charges laid down by the agency. The international lobby has come in her support, alleging the Indian government is hounding Ayyub for her “fearless” journalist. Twitter user Hawk Eye, who had initially busted the alleged charity scam by Rana, has published another thread on Twitter explaining how the scam took place. In the thread, Hawk Eye compared the claims made by Ayyub with what actually happened in the background.
In the Tweet threat, Hawk Eye published the timeline of the events that took place across three campaigns run by Ayyub on crowdfunding platform Ketto. During the first campaign that ran from April 2020 to May 2020, she made three claims. On April 28, 2020, Ayyub had posted on Twitter that she had provided relief material to 2500 families. On May 17, she alleged her team provided relief material to 23 thousand families across Maharashtra, including migrant workers, Adivasi families and more.
Take a close look at this illustration and the entire charity scandal’s modus-operandi will be clear.
— The Hawk Eye (@thehawkeyex) February 13, 2022
How to read: At the center check the timeline and follow the sequence of events in order only.
(spent 2 min time on this infographic before scrolling down)
2/ pic.twitter.com/fHlcsbufX8
The next claim was made on May 18, 2020, in which she said to have arranged transport for 600 migrants. Amidst all the claims, she quietly created an FD of Rs 50 lakh in her father’s name allegedly to establish a Covid care centre or a hospital. In the first campaign, she had collected 1.24 crore.
When she started the second campaign, to boost up her image, she allegedly flaunted tall claims for her previous campaign. She claimed to have provided relief to 70,000 families and sent 10,000 migrant workers back to their homes. She further claimed the distribution of relief material including 8 tonnes of food, 80,000 litres of milk, 50,000 litres of oil, 50,000 KG pulses, 1 lakh KG flour, 700 PPE kits and more.
And then started a series of tall claims & photo-ops. Rana claimed to provide relief to 70K families & sent 10K migrants home, 8 tonnes of food, 80K ltr milk, 50K ltr oil, 50k kg dal, 100k kg flour, 700 PPE kits etc. The estimation of such relief work would be in crores.
— The Hawk Eye (@thehawkeyex) February 13, 2022
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Hawk Eye said, “One month of relief to 15K families would cost with rough estimate 4.5Cr (with just 100/- per day of a family of 4 members). Rana Ayyub claimed to have sent 10,000 migrants from Mumbai to Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Madhya Pradesh (a rough estimate would be 37.5L). However, NO bills were produced to ED/I-T that of transport.”
During the investigation, Rana produced bills worth 40 Lakh to the ED that included Taurpolin sheets and grains. Hawk Eye said, “The biggest lie was, in August 2020 claimed that “all funds are exhausted & donate more”, while 50 Lakhs FD and 57 Lakh unutilized funds are reported at the same time by ED.”
To put things in perspective, she had alleged to have donated sunflower oil in the relief package. At that time, the price of a one-litre pack of sunflower oil was around Rs 140. If she got a discount for buying in bulk, it would not have been less than Rs 125 per pack. She claimed to have donated 50,000 such packets that would clock to 62 lakh 50 thousand just for the oil. Similarly, she would have spent Rs 30 lakh on the flour and approx 32 lakh on rice. Only these three items sum up to an estimate of 1 crore 24 lakh. However, she had collected only 1.24 crore from the campaign, out of which 50 Lakh were used for FD, and 57 Lakh were lying in her account unutilized as per ED.
“70K families & 10K migrants”
— The Hawk Eye (@thehawkeyex) February 13, 2022
“50L FD to earmark hospital & earn interest” when ppl were dying of starvation (as per one tweet).
“My PAN not available” but sister’s one was arranged who live abroad”
“Hospital refused to accept a 90L donation bcz I writes against govt.”
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Hawk Eye added that her fictional stories, from her PAN not being available to the hospital refusing to accept donations, have fallen flat. What he found most hilarious was the argument where she donated 74.5 Lakh CM/PM Care funds because funds were unutilized, even during the deadly second wave!! Notably, she keeps questioning PM Care day and night.
ED seized 1.77 crore funds in Rana Ayyub and her family’s accounts
On February 10, OpIndia had reported that ED seized Rs 1.77 crore in Ayyub’s and her family’s accounts under the Money Laundering Act. The ED has, in its attachment order, said, “Rana Ayyub has cheated the general Public Donors in a pre-planned manner and with the intention to cheat the general public donors”.
