Minister of Ecclesiastical Affairs Manu Sarren has for years failed to pay a substantial amount of money he had promised to poor orphans in India.
According to tabloid daily BT, the Minister agreed in 2007 to give 3 kroner for every sold copy of his best-selling children's book, 'Iqbal Farooq and the Crown Jewels', to the Child Fund Association orphanage in Bangalore, and confirmed the deal a year later when he vowed to give so much that 'there would be no royalties left'. BT has now revealed that Mr Sareen, originally born in India, kept the money himself.
A letter from the orphanage confirms that the Minister donated no more than DKK2,000, even though his book has sold 7,831 copes and the amount should have been DKK23,551.
Mr Sareen acknowledged the mistake and has now transferred DKK24,000 to the orphanage and another DKK4,000 to his father to be spent on blankets for poor people in his native country.