Electoral Bonds Case: SC dismisses application of SBI, orders to submit details by tomorrow

March 11, 2024

New Delhi: The Supreme Court dismissed an application of the State Bank of India (SBI) seeking an extension of time till June 30 to submit details of Electoral Bonds to the Election Commission of India.

The court has asked SBI to disclose the details of Electoral Bonds by the close of business hours on March 12, i.e., tomorrow.

Supreme Court even directed the Election Commission to compile all the information and publish the details on its official website by March 15 before 5 pm.

Directing to disclose details of electoral bonds, the Supreme Court warned SBI that it will initiate contempt proceedings against it if the details of Electoral Bonds are not submitted by SBI to the Election Commission by March 12.

In its order, the Constitution Bench noted that the Electoral Bonds Scheme — which had been held unconstitutional on February 15 — itself mandated SBI to disclose information when demanded by a court.

In an application filed on March 4, the SBI said that “decoding” of the Electoral Bonds and the matching of the donor to the donations is a complex and time-consuming exercise and the timeline of three weeks would not be sufficient for the entire exercise to be completed.

In a verdict delivered on February 15, the Supreme Court struck down the Electoral Bonds Scheme, 2018 as unconstitutional and ordered the SBI to forthwith stop their issuance. It had asked the SBI to submit details of the Electoral Bonds purchased since April 2019 to the Election Commission of India by March 6 for publication on the official website of the poll body.

“SBI must disclose details of each Electoral Bond encashed by political parties which shall include the date of encashment and the denomination of the Electoral Bond. SBI shall submit the above information to the ECI within three weeks from the date of this judgment, that is, by March 6, 2024,” it had said