New Delhi: The Supreme Court on Friday took note of the State Bank of India (SBI) not disclosing the unique identification numbers of electoral bonds while furnishing the data regarding their purchase and redemption to the Election Commission of India (ECI).
The electoral bond numbers would help establish the link between donors and political parties.
The Constitution bench issued notice to the SBI and sought an explanation on its query over the non-declaration of bond numbers by Monday.
The bank had given the data to ECI on 12 March, following which the poll panel made it public on its website Thursday evening. The two developments were subsequent to the top court’s 11 March order dismissing the SBI’s request for more time to handover the required data to the ECI.
The top court had first asked for this information from the SBI in its landmark verdict on 14 February, which struck down the bond scheme and held it unconstitutional.
Introduced by the BJP in 2018, the electoral bond scheme was touted by the government as a move towards transparency in poll funding. The bonds allowed individuals and companies to anonymously donate money to parties.
During the hearing, the top court pointed out the discrepancy in the data that was uploaded on the ECI’s portal Thursday. It recalled its order to reiterate that the direction warranted the SBI to disclose date of purchase of the bond, the bond holder, the value as well as the bond number. For the bonds redeemed, similar information was sought.
Senior advocate Kapil Sibal, appearing for the petitioners, also mentioned the 14 February order to highlight the missing information on bond numbers.
Advocate Prashant Bhushan submitted that SBI in its own affidavit had acknowledged it was in possession of the data on the bonds, albeit in two silos. “The order clearly says the bond number should be given,” he argued.
At Solicitor General Tushar Mehta’s intervention, the court agreed to hear the SBI counsel before issuing its order. The court, however, observed: “SBI counsel should have been present today.”
On Mehta’s clarification that the SBI was not a formal party in the case, the top court went on to issue notice to the bank and fixed Monday to hear the matter again.
The five-judge bench voiced its concern over the missing electoral bond numbers while hearing the ECI’s application related to sealed cover reports that were submitted to the court in April 2019.
This was pursuant to an interim order to the ECI to submit a report on how many bonds were purchased and redeemed between the date when the scheme was notified and April 2019.
The reports contained information about electoral bonds that were purchased as well as redeemed by political parties since the introduction of the scheme in 2018.
As per the 11 March directive, the ECI was also to publish this report on its website forthwith. However, as per its latest application, the poll panel did not have the information, it said.
The body claimed it had only one set of papers, which was given to the court in April 2019. Through its application, the ECI requested the court to return the sealed cover reports to it to enable them to comply with the court’s order.
The court allowed the ECI’s application and asked its registry to digitise the data before giving the sealed cover reports back to the Commission.
(Edited by Tikli Basu)
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