A company founded by BJP Rajya Sabha MP from Andhra Pradesh, C.M. Ramesh, purchased electoral bonds worth ₹5 crore weeks after it bagged the ₹1,098-crore Engineering, Procurement and Construction (EPC) contract for the Sunni hydroelectric project in Himachal Pradesh. This tranche was purchased just ahead of the Assembly elections in Tripura, Meghalaya, and Nagaland. Two months later, the company again purchased bonds worth ₹40 crore.
Rithwik Projects Private Limited (RPPL), a private, unlisted company incorporated in Hyderabad on March 31, 1999, was awarded the EPC contract on January 14, 2023, just days after another project that it was involved in – the Tapovan Vishnugad Hydro-electric Project in Uttarakhand — ran into rough weather following the collapse of roads and homes at Josimath, a town located close to the project site. Townspeople and some experts blamed the underground tunnelling at an ecologically sensitive site for Josimath’s gradual subsidence, aside from several other reasons.
