Compelled by the Supreme Court, the State Bank of India and the Election Commission have released a list of those who purchased electoral bonds, taking a long step towards lifting the veil of secrecy over campaign finance in India. This is, undoubtedly, a watershed moment for transparency, and the citizen’s right to know — which lie at the heart of the democratic pact and promise. The Court’s judgment striking down the electoral bonds scheme, and its subsequent order pushing the SBI to submit the data are, therefore, immensely welcome. The revelations of donor names will help pierce the black box of the relationship between big business and politics.
At one level, it is deeply symbiotic — the list points to the possibility of some donations being linked to entities securing lucrative contracts or licences at both the central and state level. There are also indications of donations to political parties tending to follow investigations against the donor companies by agencies such as the Enforcement Directorate. The data points to a severely skewed system of election finance that the ruling party at the Centre and in several states, the BJP, has evidently benefitted from.
A significantly large number of donors are from sectors that are more tightly controlled, more regulated by the government. These sectors — such as mining, telecom, infrastructure, real estate and construction — are where clearances and licences are required, and where contracts are awarded by governments. Instances of donations by those in sectors lightly regulated by the government are few. For example, in the mining and steel sectors, Vedanta Ltd, Rungta Sons pvt ltd, Jindal Steel and Power, Essel Mining and Industries and Dempo bought bonds worth Rs 825 crore, while in telecom, Bharti Airtel purchased bonds worth Rs 198 crore. There are other examples as well.
As reported in this paper, Megha Engineering and Infrastructure Ltd purchased bonds adding up to Rs 140 crore on April 11, 2023, a month before winning the tender for the Rs 14,400 crore Thane-Borivali twin tunnel project. The data also shows that three of the top five donors purchased bonds even as they faced probes by the Enforcement Directorate and Income tax authorities. For instance, as reported in this paper, on April 2, 2022, the ED attached moveable assets worth Rs 409.92 crore in the money laundering case against Future Gaming. Five days later, the company purchased bonds worth Rs 100 crore. In another case, Aurobindo Pharma, which is entangled in the Delhi liquor case, donated Rs 49 crore. The majority of its bond purchases were in 2022 and 2023 — in November 2022, the ED had arrested the company director.
The State Bank of India has, however, not provided the unique alphanumeric code on the electoral bonds. This code would allow the matching of each and every donation by the donors to the political parties. On Friday, the Supreme Court issued a notice to the SBI on the question of a fuller disclosure. This is necessary to provide greater clarity on the questions of who paid whom, when they did so — and why.
