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The Supreme Court on Monday dismissed an application by the State Bank of India (SBI) for time till June 30, 2024 to provide details of electoral bonds purchased anonymously and their encashment by political parties. The Court simultaneously asked the lender to submit details of electoral bond scheme by close of business hours of March 12.
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“Submissions of SBI in application indicate that information sought is readily available. Thus, the application by SBI seeking extension of time until June 30 is dismissed,” a five-judge Constitution Bench comprising Chief Justice DY Chandrachud and Justices Sanjiv Khanna, BR Gavai, JB Pardiwala, and Manoj Misra, said in their order.
Racing against time
Post submission of details, Election Commission of India has been instructed to publish the details on its website by 5 pm on March 15. The Court had, in its February 15 judgement wherein it struck down electoral bonds as unconstitutional, issued instructions to the SBI to submit all details pertaining to electoral bons by March 6. However, just before the March 6 deadline lapsed, SBI filed an application seeking more on grounds of operational difficulty. The SBI wanted time until June 30, well after the general elections, to furnish these details.
Following the SBI’s plea, contempt petitions was filed by two non government organisations — Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and Common Cause — against the SBI for “wilful disobedience” of the Court’s orders. The Court put the SBI on notice and directed its CMD to file an affidavit after complying with its orders. “While we are not inclined to exercise the contempt jurisdiction at this time, we place SBI on notice that this Court may be inclined to proceed against it for wilful disobedience if SBI does not comply with the directions by the timelines indicated in this order,” the top court said.
Senior advocate Harish Salve, for the SBI, explained that matching the bonds purchased and names of donors with the parties which redeemed the bonds was a “time-consuming and complex” exercise. Details were kept in two separate silos and not stored in a digital format. The judgment had capsized the “core purpose” of the electoral bonds scheme, which was “utmost secrecy”.
“We have to reverse the whole process”, Salve argued.
But Chief Justice Chandrachud said the judgment had not asked the bank to “match” information to ascertain who contributed to which political parties.
“We did not tell you to match the details. We had only asked you to do a plain disclosure. We just wanted you to comply with the judgment,” the Chief Justice said.
The Bench noted that the details to be disclosed are readily available with the SBI. “Directions of this court requires SBI to disclose information which is already available with it. The FAQs on electoral bonds state that the KYC documents must be submitted by the purchaser each time that the bond is purchased irrespective of that purchaser has a KYC verified purchaser account. Thus, details of EB purchased and directed to be disclosed is readily available,” the order said.
“Comply with what is in black and white in the judgment,” Justice Gavai, on the Bench, told Salve.
Tough stand
Chief Justice Chandrachud pointed out that the SBI had not even bothered to mention what it had been doing since the February 15 judgment. “You are the SBI… There should be some candour from your part. What have you been doing for the past 26 days? There is not a word about that in your application,” he said.
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The SBI affidavit supporting the application had neither been sworn by the Chairman or the Managing Director of State Bank of India. It was sworn by one Narendra Pratap Singh, an Assistant General Manager working at Corporate Centre, State Bank of India, Mumbai. On Court’s observation that the SBI chose to have an Assistant General Manager file the application in response to a Constitution Bench judgment of the Supreme Court, Salve said: “He is the man on the spot.”
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