Complying with the directions of the Supreme Court, The Election Commission of India on Thursday uploaded on its website the data about the purchase and redemption of electoral bonds as received from the State Bank of India (SBI).
ECI said the State Bank of India had provided the data about the electoral bonds to the commission on March 12. While scrapping the Electoral Bond Scheme the Supreme Court directed the SBI to give the ECI the data.
SBI has shared two sets of data; one with the name of the purchaser, date and denomination of the bonds and the second one with the name of the political party, date and denomination of bonds encashed.
It is impossible to accurately link the donations by the entities to any political party. 1,368 crore were given as donations by Future Gaming And Hotel Services, the data shows.
“It may be recalled that in the said matter, ECI has consistently and categorically weighed in favour of disclosure and transparency, a position reflected in the proceedings of the Hon’ble Supreme Court and noted in the order also,” read the press note.
On March 4, the SBI moved the court seeking additional time till June 30, stating that matching each donation to the party was time-consuming.
The court on Monday clarified that it had not asked for the matching exercise to be done and directed the bank to send the name of the buyer, the date and denomination of every bond sold, and the name of the party, date of redemption, and denomination of every bond redeemed from April 12, 2019, onwards to the ECI by the close of business hours on Tuesday, 12 March.
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