Opposition parties on Thursday hit out at the Centre over the State Bank of India (SBI) seeking more time from the Supreme Court to disclose details of electoral bonds and claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is “absolutely terrified” of revealing his corporate donors to people.
The SBI moved the Supreme Court on Monday, seeking an extension till June 30 to disclose the details of each electoral bond encashed by political parties. In its verdict last month, the top court directed the bank to furnish the details to the Election Commission (EC) by March 6.
While Congress chief spokesman Jairam Ramesh hit out at the government, saying, “Hide and seek in New India: Nation seeks, Modi hides!”, CPI(M) said SBI approaching the apex court to extend the June 30 deadline is an “obvious ploy” to ensure the details are not revealed before the Lok Sabha elections.
The CPIM said SBI approaching the apex court to extend the June 30 deadline for handing over details related to electoral bonds to the Election Commission of India is an “obvious ploy” to ensure the details are not revealed before the Lok Sabha elections. “The Pradhan Mantri Chanda Chipao Yojana, implemented by the SBI, is built on lies,” he said. “The SBI’s excuse was that its data on sale and encashment of electoral bonds is decoupled to maintain anonymity. According to the SBI, it would take months to match the buyers of the 22,217 electoral bonds issued since 2019 with the beneficiary parties,” Ramesh added.
“In fact, the Finance Ministry is on record having noted in 2017 that ‘The records of the purchaser are always available in the banking channel and may be retrieved as and when required by enforcement agencies’. What has changed between now and then?” Ramesh asked.
“We also know for a fact that in 2018, when a political party tried to encash some electoral bonds that had expired, the SBI sought permission from the Finance Ministry and moved with alacrity to enable the encashment of these bonds,” he said.
In a statement issued, the Politburo of the CPI(M) said, it is “unbelievable” that the State Bank of India, whose operations are digitised, cannot compile all the relevant details of electoral bonds in a few days’ time, and alleged that the bank took the step under government’s pressure.