BJP dubs Indian Express report on USAID as ‘fake’ without reading

NRIs and diplomats have been chuckling over the BJP’s hysterical attacks on the Congress and Rahul Gandhi for having allegedly received a $21 million grant from USAID in 2022 to influence the outcome of elections in India. “MAGA stupidly mixed up Bangladesh and India because to them, we are just a vague brown blob. And then Sanghis stupidly ran with it, without even checking if such money was ever sent,” NRI Gaurav Sabnis posted on X.

Ironically, the BJP’s IT cell chief Amit Malviya blindly trusted the repeat statement of President Donald Trump who, while addressing Republican governors, repeated the original mistake (?) of confusing Delhi with Dhaka. An amused former ambassador K.C. Singh reacted by posting that ‘apropos allegation of USAID money for altering Indian electoral outcome, the lesson is clear. Don’t jump at each statement of his. He lives in parallel reality & lies glibly.”

Malviya’s touching faith in President Trump, however, prompted him to claim that ‘the Indian Express story discusses $21 million in funding to Bangladesh in 2022. However, the article misrepresents the reference to a $21 million funding tranche intended to ‘promote’ voter turnout in India. What Indian Express conveniently sidesteps is the 2012 Memorandum of Understanding signed between the Election Commission of India — under the leadership of S.Y. Quraishi…”.

What Malviya sidesteps is Trump’s well-known and well-documented ignorance of geography. The husband of one of President Trump’s own aides had compiled as many as 19 instances of the US President putting his foot in his mouth, including the time he famously said Paris was a city in Germany (briefly under German occupation is probably what he had meant), Belgium was a city, not a country; Finland was part of Russia, and so on.

Equally famously, he had mispronounced Nepal as ‘nipple’ and Bhutan as ‘button’. Several American commentators believe that the US President has no idea where Ukraine is. It is, therefore, perfectly conceivable that to him and his team, Dhaka and Delhi appear one and the same.

Even more tellingly, if Malviya had bothered to read the Indian Express report, he would not have missed the following details:

• According to the official open data source of US federal spending, there has been no USAID funded CEPPS project in India since 2008

• The only ongoing USAID grant to CEPPS matching the denomination of $21 million and the purpose of voting was sanctioned — with Federal Award Identification Number 72038822LA00001 — in July 2022 for USAID’s  ‘Amar Vote Amar’ (my vote is mine), a project in Bangladesh.

• In November 2022, the purpose of this grant was modified to “USAID’s Nagorik (Citizen) Program”. A USAID advisor in Dhaka confirmed this on social media while on a US visit in December 2024: “The USAID-funded $21 million CEPPS/Nagorik project… which I manage.” Meant to run for three years until July 2025, this grant has already spent $13.4 million, records show.

• Between July 2022 and October 2024, this $21-million grant was split into six sub-grants: two each for three CEPPS member organisations — International Foundation for Electoral Systems (IFES); International Republican Institute (IRI); and National Democratic Institute (NDI). IFES is based in Arlington, Virginia; IRI and NDI have their headquarters in Washington, DC.

• On 11 September 2024, a month after Sheikh Hasina’s ouster on 5 August, the Micro Governance Research (MGR) program of the University of Dhaka and MGR’s director, associate professor Aynul Islam posted, 'It’s Not Suddenly "Spring"' and added, “Hello Bangladesh 2.0… 544 youth events and programs in the university campuses across Bangladesh” were organised in two years since September 2022 “to promote youth democratic leadership and civic engagement that directly reached 10,264 university youth through 221 action projects and 170 democracy sessions, among others…”

• Islam acknowledged that “all these were possible with the generous support and partnership from the IFES and USAID Bangladesh under the #Nagorik program.” Islam is a senior consultant (civic and youth engagement) with IFES. In December 2024, he became the founding director of Applied Democracy Lab (ADL), established at the University of Dhaka “with support from USAID and IFES”, according to him.

• On 8 January, days before it was wound up, USAID Bangladesh posted on Facebook: “Excited to partner with the University of Dhaka to unveil the new Applied Democracy Lab (ADL).” Contacted by the Indian Express and speaking over the phone from Dhaka, Islam confirmed that USAID funded the Nagorik programme through CEPPS.

• The final NDI-IRI TAM report published in March 2024 noted: “Many stakeholders made credible accusations that state security services and other government institutions at times unevenly enforced election rules to favour the ruling Awami League. The scale of the government’s efforts to arrest opposition members and restrict or disrupt opposition political activities was not satisfactorily justified and generated a widespread perception of politicized law enforcement during the election period.”

• IRI also held a nationwide opinion poll in Bangladesh in August 2023 that showed a majority of Bangladeshis believed the country was “headed in the wrong direction”.

• The US newly formed Department of Government Efficiency’s (DOGE) list of cancelled grants also included a $29.9-million USAID funding to Democracy International (DI) for “strengthening the political landscape in Bangladesh”. Awarded in 2017, this grant was to be concluded in October 2025. DI’s Dhaka office declined to comment.

• While USAID and CEPPS have closed their websites, DOGE has not responded to a query posed on X.