Electoral bonds unconstitutional

In a landmark judgement that delivered a big blow to the government the Supreme Court on Thursday annulled the electoral bonds scheme for political funding saying it violates the Constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression as well as the right to information In its verdict months ahead of the Lok Sabha polls the apex court ordered the State Bank of India SBI to disclose to the Election Commission the names of the contributors to the sixyearold schemeA fivejudge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud directed that the SBI must disclose details of each electoral bond encashed by political parties The information should include the date of encashment and the denomination of the bonds and be submitted to the poll panel by March 6The Election Commission should publish the information shared by SBI on its official website by March 13 the bench said The CJI said the scheme is violative of the right to freedom of speech and expression under Article 191a of Constitution ldquoThe electoral bonds scheme and the impugned provisions to the extent that they infringe on the right to information of the voter by anonymising contribution through electoral bonds are violative of Article 19 1ardquo the CJI saidPower of votes over notes CongressThe Congress on Thursday welcomed the Supreme Court verdict striking down the electoral bonds scheme and said that it will reinforce the power of votes over notes The opposition party also said that it hopes that the Modi Government will stop resorting to such ldquomischievous ideasrdquo in the future and listen to the Supreme Court so that democracy transparency and levelplaying field persist In a post on X Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge welcomed the Supreme Court decision and hoped the government will stop resorting to ldquosuch mischievous ideasrdquo in the future He said the Congress had called the scheme ldquoopaque and undemocraticrdquo when it was launched Subsequently in the 2019 manifesto the Congress promised to scrap the Modi governmentrsquos ldquodubious schemerdquo ldquoWe welcome the decision of the Supreme Court today which has struck down this lsquoBlack Money Conversionrsquo scheme of the Modi Government calling it lsquoUnconstitutionalrsquolsquoOppn politicising as no alternative to ModirsquoThe BJP on Thursday sought to downplay the Supreme Court verdict on electoral bonds saying every decision of the apex court should be respected and accused the opposition parties of politicising the issue BJP spokesperson Nalin Kohli said the Opposition is politicising the issue as it does not have any alternative to Prime Minister Narendra Modirsquos leadership and the positive work done by his government The BJPrsquos reaction came after the Supreme Court in a landmark judgement annulled the electoral bonds scheme ahead of the Lok Sabha polls ldquoWe practice in the courts and on a daily basis the cases are won and lostrdquo Kohli told PTI when asked for his comment Any order of the Supreme Court or its judgement has to be accepted and respected he addedlsquoHistoric in interest of clean democracyrsquoFormer Chief Election Commissioner T S Krishnamurthy termed as ldquohistoricrdquo the Supreme Court verdict on Thursday annulling the electoral bonds scheme for political funding and said itrsquos in the interest of a clean democracy Speaking to PTI Krishnamurthy said he entirely agreed with the judgment noting that he had made public statements in the past that the electoral bonds scheme is not right for transparency in political funding In fact Krishnamurthy said the scheme is not at all the right method though it was claimed that it is promoting transparency because it goes through the banking channel ldquoBut the origin of the funding and name of the donor are not known And how do you know if itrsquos clean money or dirty money itrsquos not knownrdquo he pointed out ldquoIt is a historic judgment itrsquos in the interest of a clean democracy I only hope that the political parties will learn their lessonsrdquo Krishnamurthy addedCPIM hails apex court verdictWelcoming the Supreme Court judgment striking down electoral bonds the CPIM on Thursday said it was an ldquounscrupulous scheme designed to help the ruling partyrdquo and it was now essential to introduce reforms for political and electoral funding In a widely anticipated judgement ahead of the Lok Sabha elections the Supreme Court annulled the electoral bonds scheme for political funding saying it violates the Constitutional right to freedom of speech and expressionlsquoImportant to ensure transparencyrsquoThe Aam Aadmi Party welcomed the Supreme Courtrsquos decision on electoral bonds saying it is an important step in ensuring transparency in election funding In a landmark judgment that delivered a big blow to the government ldquoWe welcome this decision Otherwise through electoral bonds it was not known which person was giving funds to which party It is important for countryrsquos democracy that it is knownrdquo said AAP leader AtishiThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever