What Nirmala Sitharaman said on top electoral bond donors, probe agency raids.
As the electoral bonds data released by the Election Commission (EC) revealed that at least 15 out of the top 30 companies that donated to political parties faced action from probe agencies, Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said the narrative of a link between the raids and donations was based on “assumptions”.
Sitharaman also said that the previous system of donations to political parties was “completely imperfect”. This was a reference to the electoral trusts scheme, which was introduced by the UPA government in 2013.
“I think you’ve based yourself on huge assumptions, that the money was given after the Enforcement Directorate raid happened,” Sitharaman said, commenting on a question about the data released.
“What if the companies gave the money, and after that, we still went and knocked at their doors through the Enforcement Directorate? That’s an assumption that the Enforcement Directorate went and knocked at their doors, they wanted to save themselves, and therefore they came up with the funds,” the Finance Minister said.
“The second assumption in that itself is, are you sure they gave it to the BJP? They probably gave it to the regional parties,” she further said.
WHAT SITHARAMAN SAID ON ELECTORAL BONDS CASE
On Thursday, the Election Commission published data on electoral bonds on its website after receiving the information from the State Bank of India as per the directions of the Supreme Court.
On Friday, the Supreme Court rapped the SBI for not disclosing the unique alpha-numeric numbers of the electoral bonds received by political parties and sought the bank’s response.
Reacting to this, Sitharaman said, “The case is still in court, the verdict has come and the State Bank of India will submit what it has to.”
“Let us recall what my predecessor (former Finance Minister Arun Jaitley) said when he brought this electoral bonds scheme. He had said ‘this is better than the previous systems as the money is going from accounts to party’s account’,” she said.
“It’s not a perfect system, but we have moved from a system where everyone did what they want to do,” the Finance Minister said, adding, “A system which was not perfect, from a system which was completely imperfect, was brought in.”
WHAT ARE ELECTORAL BONDS?
The electoral bonds were introduced by the government on January 28, 2017. The objective was to facilitate transparent political funding. The bonds, issued exclusively by SBI, served as a designated financial instrument that offered individuals and corporate entities the opportunity to contribute funds to political parties discreetly, as those bonds had no identification of the donor and the political party to which they were issued.
Electoral bonds were available in denominations of Rs 1,000 and could be acquired from SBI branches during specific periods stipulated by the government. Political parties could then redeem those bonds through their designated accounts within a prescribed timeframe.
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