EC makes electoral bonds data public, over Rs 6,000 crore donations to BJP

The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Thursday made public the data it received from the State Bank of India (SBI) on electoral bonds public. Following a Supreme Court directive, the SBI had shared the data with the poll panel on 12 March.

The top court had given the commission time until 5.00 pm of 15 March to upload the data on its website. The EC has published the details on 'Disclosure of Electoral Bonds submitted by SBI' in two parts.

According to the data uploaded by the poll panel, the buyers of electoral bonds include Grasim Industries, Megha Engineering, Piramal Enterprises, Torrent Power, Bharti Airtel, DLF Commercial Developers, Vedanta Ltd., Apollo Tyres, Lakshmi Mittal, Edelweiss, PVR, Keventer, Sula Wine, Welspun, and Sun Pharma.

The parties that redeemed electoral bonds include the BJP, Congress, AIADMK, BRS, Shiv Sena, TDP, YSR Congress, DMK, JDS, NCP, Trinamool Congress, JDU, RJD, AAP, and the Samajwadi Party, according to the data.

Of the total amount redeemed, over Rs 6,000 crore of the donations went to the BJP.

In a landmark verdict delivered on 15 February, a five-judge Constitution bench had scrapped the Centre's electoral bonds scheme that allowed anonymous political funding, calling it "unconstitutional", and ordered disclosure by the ECI of donors, the amount donated by them, and the recipients.

More details awaited