Electoral Bonds Case: SBI Chairman Files Compliance Affidavit After Top Court's Rebuke
The affidavit states that all the details have now been furnished, except the complete account numbers of the political parties and KYC details of the purchasers.
After the Supreme Court pulled up the country's largest lender for failing to furnish the alphanumeric codes on electoral bonds, State Bank of India Chairman Dinesh Kumar Khara filed a compliance affidavit before the court, stating that all the details have now been duly furnished to the Election Commission of India.
All details pertaining to the bond purchasers, such as date of purchase, bond number, name of the purchaser, etc., have been furnished to the ECI, the affidavit said. In addition, all the redemption details of political parties, such as the date of encashment, the last four digits of the account number, and bond numbers, have also been furnished to the ECI.
The affidavit states that the complete bank account numbers of the political parties have not been made public, as it may compromise the security of those accounts. Similarly, KYC details of the purchasers have also not been made public for security reasons.
Last month, the top court struck down the electoral bond scheme in a unanimous ruling, calling it unconstitutional.
The electoral bond scheme is violative of the right to information and the right to freedom of speech and expression provided under Article 19(1)(a), ruled a five-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud.
Consequently, the court directed SBI to furnish the electoral bond data to the Election Commission of India by March 6, which in turn was supposed to make the data public by March 13.
Citing certain "practical difficulties" with the decoding exercise and the timeline fixed for it, SBI sought an extension of the March 6 deadline until June 30.
However, the court said that the bank was not required to undertake any kind of decoding exercise and all that it had to do was make a "plain disclosure" of the data to the ECI.
Consequently, the court rejected SBI's plea for an extension and directed it to furnish the data by March 12, which in turn had to be made public by the EC on its official website by 5 p.m. on March 15.
