Making sense of the electoral bonds data

A five-judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud, which was hearing an application filed by the ECI seeking a modification of the operative portion of its March 11 order in the electoral bonds case, directed its registrar (judicial) to ensure that the data filed earlier by the poll panel before it in a sealed cover be scanned and digitised.

The Supreme Court on March 15 sought a response from the State Bank of India (SBI) on the non-disclosure of the unique alphanumeric numbers of individual electoral bonds to the Election Commission of India (ECI) for publication on its official website.

A five-judge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice D.Y. Chandrachud, which was hearing an application filed by the ECI seeking a modification of the operative portion of its March 11 order in the electoral bonds case, directed its registrar (judicial) to ensure that the data filed earlier by the poll panel before it in a sealed cover be scanned and digitised.

It said this be preferably carried out by 5 p.m. on Saturday and once the exercise is completed, the original documents be returned to the ECI.

The ECI had given these documents to the court in sealed envelopes and boxes.

On February 15, the five-judge Bench, in its judgment, had directed the ECI to publish, along with the details of electoral bonds in its possession, the confidential information passed on to the court.

The ready availability of the digitised copy of the documents, that too taken by the Supreme Court itself, would help avert any delay in the publication of these records regarding the electoral bonds.

The SBI had said a total of 22,217 electoral bonds were purchased and 22,030 were redeemed by political parties between April 1, 2019 and February 15, 2024. While the remaining 187 were redeemed and the money was deposited in the Prime Minister’s National Relief Fund, in accordance with the scheme’s rules.