Unravelling the Bond story

The Supreme Court’s rejection of plea of inability of the State Bank of India to reveal the details of Electoral Bonds sold prior to April 12, 2019 comes as a fresh stern reprimand to the Bank and reiteration of its resolve to bring the entire details in the public domain.

The apex court on Monday once again asserted that it would not stop short of anything other than the ‘full details’ and set the fresh date of March 21 to comply by it.

The piecemeal revelation of data and reluctance to furnish the alphanumeric numbers of the bonds is symptomatic of the largest public sector bank’s bid to withhold information that is vital to democratic norms of transparency.

In its latest intervention on Monday, the bank has made it clear that its former directive should have left no room for confusion or misgivings.

The Court castigated the bank’s attitude of releasing data in driblets and clarified that when they say “all details”, it includes all conceivable data.

Nearly a week has passed since the apex court had scrapped the Electoral Bond scheme introduced in 2017 as’ illegal’ and ‘unconstitutional’ and asked the SBI to place the entire details on the website of Election Commission of India.

However, the bank’s attitude has been akin to acting as the arm of the current BJP government as could be gleaned from its reluctance.

By now it is crystal clear that the EBs scheme was not only opaque to the people, the main stakeholders in a democracy, but stacked the advantages on the side of the government in that the party running the government not only knew who and how much was donating to it but also knew who and how much was donating to its opponents.

As details are gradually appearing in a section of media not favourably disposed towards the current Modi government, it is abundantly clear how the various institutions of governance like the Central Bureau of Investigation, Income Tax department, Enforcement Directorate were roped into the task of promoting the sale of EBs through intimidation of corporates and as to who was the ultimate beneficiary.

It will not take long to see the connection between the ED or IT raids, the purchase and encashment of the EBs and quashing of investigations against those who fill in line.

Yet it would be revelation of alphanumeric number and the data prior to April 12, 2019 that would fix seal of authenticity on the connections between donors, recipients, and the catalysing action initiated by the above agencies.

The court’s current lashing leaves no one in doubt that the bank’s pleas has no takers, least of all the apex court. It is just not acceptable that such data is not electronically documented.

The bank’s pleas fly in the face of state-of-the-art digital infrastructure and its previous assertions with regard to its capacity to unearth transactions in a jiffy.

The SBI is not fooling anyone except bringing discredit to itself.