The Election Commission on Sunday made public fresh data on electoral bonds, which it had submitted to the Supreme Court in sealed covers and was later asked to put in public domain.
These details are believed to be pertaining to the period before April 12, 2019. Last week, the poll panel had made public electoral bond details after this specific date as per the directive of the Supreme Court.
"Data so received from political parties was deposited in the Supreme Court without opening sealed covers. In pursuance of the Supreme Court's order dated March 15, 2024, the Registry of the Supreme Court has returned physical copies along with a digitized record of the same in a pen drive in sealed cover. The Election Commission of India has today uploaded the data received in the digitized form from the registry of the Supreme Court on electoral bonds on its website," the Commission said in a statement.
As per the fresh details, the BJP encashed electoral bonds totalling Rs 6,986.50 crore while the DMK received 656.50 crore. Lottery king Santiago Martin’s Future Gaming, who contributed Rs 509 crore, is the top donor for the Dravidian party.
Future Gaming was the biggest purchaser of electoral bonds at Rs 1,368 crore, of which nearly 37 per cent went to the DMK.
The Congress redeemed a total of Rs 1,334.35 crore through electoral bonds while Mamata Banerjee’s Trinamool Congress received Rs 1,397 crore. The Bharat Rashtra Smaiti and the YSR Congress redeemed bonds worth Rs 1,322 crore and Rs 442.8 crore respectively.
The TDP redeemed bonds worth Rs 181.35 crore, Shiv Sena Rs 60.4 crore, RJD 56 crore, Samajwadi Party got Rs 14.05 crore via electoral bonds, Akali Dal Rs 7.26 crore, AIADMK Rs 6.05 crore, National Conference Rs 50 lakh.
On March 14, the Election Commission had published the data on electoral bonds submitted to it by the State Bank of India following a Supreme Court order.
The top court, in a landmark verdict on February 15, scrapped the Centre's electoral bonds scheme that allowed anonymous political funding, calling it "unconstitutional" and ordered disclosure by the EC of donors, the amount donated by them and the recipients.
The court also directed the SBI, the authorised financial institution under the scheme, to submit by March 6 the details of the electoral bonds purchased since April 12, 2019 till date to the EC.
On Monday, the apex court trashed a petition filed by the state bank seeking extension of time till June 30 to disclose the details of electoral bonds and ordered that the data be submitted to the election commission by 5 pm on Tuesday.
