SBI has handed over all the information about the electoral bond to the Election Commission. The SBI’s action comes in the context of the expiry of the time allowed by the Supreme Court to transfer the information. At the same time, if the numbers come out, it will be difficult for the central government to find out which bond has been given to which political party.
SBI was instructed to hand over to the Election Commission the information of political parties that have received electoral bonds and the unique number of each bond. But the SBI earlier handed over only the names of the companies that bought the electoral bonds and the names of the political parties to which the money was transferred. After this, SBI handed over the information after the court severely criticized it and gave strict instructions to hand over the information. The information including the alpha numerical number was given to the Election Commission.
Meanwhile, the Citizens’ Rights Trust has filed a petition in the Supreme Court demanding the release of electoral bond information from 2018 onwards. The petitioners say bonds worth Rs 40,000 crore were sold between March 2018 and April 2019. At present, the Supreme Court has directed to release the information from April 12, 2019 to February 15, 2024.
