ELECTORAL BOMBS

New Delhi: In a landmark verdict delivered within spitting distance of the Lok Sabha polls, the Supreme Court on Thursday scrapped the Modi government's electoral bonds scheme of anonymous political funding, terming it "unconstitutional" and ordering disclosure of the names of the purchasers, value of the bonds and their recipients. Holding that the 2018 scheme was "violative" of the constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression and right to information, a five-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud did not agree with the Centre's contention that it was meant to bring about transparency and curb black money in political funding. Ordering closure of the scheme forthwith, the top court also directed the State Bank of India, the authorised financial institution under the scheme, to submit by March 6 the details of electoral bonds purchased since April 12, 2019 till date to the Election Commission, which will publish the information on its official website by March 13. Under the electoral bonds scheme, ruling parties can coerce people and entities to contribute, the apex court said and rejected as "errorneous" the Centre's argument that it protects confidentiality of the contributor which is akin to the system of secret ballot.

The Bharatiya Janata Party is likely to be hit the hardest with the Supreme Court scrapping the electoral bonds scheme, as the party received over 60% of the donations made under the scheme between 2016-2022.

According to Election Commission data, 28,030 electoral bonds worth ₹ 16,437.63 crore were sold between 2016 and 2022.

The BJP was the primary beneficiary of these donations and received ₹ 10,122 crore, nearly 60% of the total donations. The main opposition Congress party came a distant second, receiving ₹ 1,547 crore or 10 per cent in the same period, while West Bengal's ruling Trinamool Congress got ₹ 823 crore or 8 per cent of all electoral bonds. Donations made to the BJP through electoral bonds were three times more than that of all other 30 parties combined on the list.

The donations received by seven national parties, according to the report are as follows:

The Samajwadi Party saw its electoral bonds contribution fall to nil, while that of the Shiromani Akali Dal was also zero. "The huge political contributions made by corporations and companies should not be allowed to conceal the reason for financial contributions made by another section of the population: a student, a daily wage worker, an artist, or a teacher. When the law permits political contributions and such contributions could be made as an expression of political support which would indicate the political affiliation of a person, it is the duty of the Constitution to protect them," it said. It said not all political contributions are made with the intent of attempting to alter public policy and contributions are also made to political parties which are not substantially represented in legislatures. "At this juncture, the close association of money and politics which has been explained above needs to be recounted. Money is not only essential for electoral outcomes and for influencing policies, it is also necessary for true democratic participation," the court said. The bench said it is true that contributions made as quid pro quo transactions are not an expression of political support. "However, to not grant the umbrella of informational privacy to political contributions only because a portion of the contributions is made for other reasons would be impermissible. The Constitution does not turn a blind eye merely because of the possibilities of misuse," it said. Justice Khanna wrote a 74-page judgement in which he gave different reasons for concurring with the verdict penned by CJI Chandrachud. Reacting to the judgement, former chief election commissioner S Y Quraishi told PTI Videos, "This will restore people's faith in democracy. "This is the greatest thing that could have happened. This is the most historic judgement that we have got from the Supreme Court in the last five-seven years. It is a great boon for democracy."