A second set of data published on Sunday by the Election Commission on electoral bonds purchased and redeemed by political parties prior to April 12, 2019 show that many of them did not disclose the identities of their donors.
This is despite a specific order of the Supreme Court on April 12, 2019 that political parties that benefited from the electoral bonds scheme should confidentially divulge to the EC the “detailed particulars of the donors as against each bond”. The order covered poll bonds bought and encashed by parties from March 2018 to April 2019.
Also read: Making sense of the electoral bonds data
“We require all the political parties who have received donations through electoral bonds to submit to the Election Commission of India (ECI) in sealed cover, detailed particulars of the donors as against the each bond; the amount of each such bond and the full particulars of the credit received against each bond, namely, the particulars of the bank account to which the amount has been credited and the date of each such credit. The above details will be furnished forthwith in respect of electoral bonds received by a political party till date,” a three-judge Bench headed by then Chief Justice of India Ranjan Gogoi had directed in the interim order of April 12, 2019.
The question why some political parties like DMK revealed their donors while others could not, either on legal or principled grounds, is likely to come up for debate before a five-judge Bench led by Chief Justice of India D.Y. Chandrachud on Monday.
The five-judge Bench is primarily seeking an explanation from the State Bank of India (SBI), the authorised bank under the scheme, on why the unique hidden alphanumeric serial numbers of each electoral bond was not included in the first tranche of data published by the EC on March 14.
The first set of data received by the EC from SBI had covered bonds purchased and redeemed by parties from April 12, 2019, till February 15, 2024, the date on which the top court struck down the anonymous political funding scheme as unconstitutional.
“The judgment (of February 15, 2024) required the State Bank of India to furnish to the ECI all details of the electoral bonds purchased, and, as the case may, redeemed by political parties, including the date of purchase/redemption, name of the purchaser and the denomination of the electoral bond purchased. It has been submitted that SBI has not disclosed the alphanumeric numbers of the electoral bonds,” the five-judge Bench said conveying its dissatisfaction with the bank in its order on March 15.
The fact that every bond has a unique number is confirmed from a March 15, 2019 affidavit filed by the Ministry of Finance in the Supreme Court, which said that “unique hidden alphanumeric serial numbers was an in-built security feature”. The unique numbers would identify which donor bought which poll bond and contributed to which political party.
Ideally, the political parties and EC could argue in court that they did not have the donor details as this was kept confidentially by the bank. However, the question may arise from the court as to why the parties or the EC did not, in all these years, seek a modification of the April 12, 2019 order to give “detailed particulars” of their donors who contributed via electoral bonds till April 2019. The EC could contend that, unlike the first set of data which was directly received from the bank, the second tranche was supplied by the political parties.
It was only on November 2, 2023, while reserving the case for judgment, that the top court had directed the EC to hand over the data on electoral bonds from before April 2019 after updating the information till September 30, 2023. The court had kept the information in its custody till the EC had sought it in an application last week. The court had returned the original documents to the EC along with a digitised version, which was published on Sunday.
The issue before the court is whether the February 15 judgment would apply to the pre-April 2019 information on electoral bonds.
The judgment has called for a complete disclosure on electoral bonds purchased from April 12, 2019 till February 15, 2024. The information required to be published by the court verdict included the date of purchase, donor name, denomination of the electoral bond, details of recipient political parties and date of encashment. The court has now made it clear that this would also include the unique alphanumeric numbers of the bonds.
Though the February 15 judgment had explicitly called for a complete disclosure on electoral bonds purchased from April 12, 2019 till February 15, 2024, the court on March 11 this year specifically instructed the EC to “publish the details of the information which was supplied to this court in pursuance of the interim orders (April 12, 2019 and November 2, 2023) on its official website”.
This would logically mean the judgment had applied for the purchase and redemption of electoral bonds in the period before April 12, 2019.
