The Supreme Court has done well to pin down a dithering State Bank of India (SBI), the sole bank authorised to issue Electoral Bonds (EBs), into disclosing details of all such bonds purchased since April, 2019. The SBI wanted time until June, well after the general elections, to submit these details. But in forcing the bank to furnish these details within 24 hours, the Court has sought to ensure that citizens who vote in the upcoming general elections can be better informed about funding received by political parties.

The bench, led by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud, came down heavily on the SBI for not complying with its judgment of February 15. The CJI minced no words at the SBI’s apparent prevarication. “Our judgement is dated February 15. Today is March 11. In the last 26 days, what is the extent of matching done by you? The affidavit is silent on this. We expect a degree of candour from the SBI,” remarked the CJI. Indeed, with all the technical expertise at its command, it is strange that the SBI found it difficult to submit the data on time. The Court was unambiguous in its February 15 judgment which, while striking down the EB Scheme as violative of the citizen’s fundamental right to be informed about who is contributing large sums to political parties, also held that the SBI shall submit details of EBs and the recipient political parties to the Election Commission by March 6, 2024.

Clearly, SBI’s defence that the information sought by the Court existed in two silos that added up to 44,434 folios of EBs was a weak one that the Court immediately trashed. If the bank believed that it could delay the inevitable disclosure with the excuse it did not have enough time to match the donor with the beneficiary party, it was bad strategy. The Court was quick to point out that it never did ask for such matching in the first place but plain disclosure of the information available with the bank. SBI’s predicament is understandable though, hemmed in as it is by a dominant shareholder who may desire to withhold information, and the bank’s own commitment to bond buyers to maintain confidentiality. But in the face of an angry Court the bank’s options were next to nothing.

To make matters worse, the affidavit supporting the Bank’s application was neither sworn by the Chairman nor the Managing Director but rather an Assistant General Manager, a fact that did not escape the CJI’s notice, although the Court did not initiate contempt proceedings as had been urged by the petitioner, putting the bank on notice instead. The SC’s follow-up action marks a welcome step in ushering transparency in electoral bonds. But it should not be forgotten that cleaning up poll funding altogether calls for a broader set of reforms, encompassing the corporate and political domains. Mere disclosure of donors and beneficiaries of EBs, which is just one form of electoral funding, is not going to move the needle significantly.

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