The State Bank of India’s request to the Supreme Court to extend the deadline to disclose information on electoral bonds indicates that it is shielding the Union government from criticism, a group of retired civil servants said on Saturday in a letter to the Election Commission.
The Supreme Court had on February 15 directed the State Bank of India to issue details of the political parties that received electoral bonds from April 12, 2019, and submit them to the Election Commission by March 6. The court had ordered this while striking down the electoral bonds scheme as unconstitutional, saying that it could lead to quid pro quo arrangements between donors and political parties.
The State Bank of India on March 4 asked the top court to extend the deadline till June 30.
On Saturday, the former bureaucrats, who are part of the Constitutional Conduct Group, said that a “pathetic excuse” had been given by “India’s largest bank with 48 crore accounts and boasting high levels of digitisation” that its records were stored manually.
The letter to the Election Commission said that former general secretary of the All India Banking Officers Confederation Thomas Franco had pointed out that the State Bank of India had in 2018 asked the Union government for more than Rs 60 lakh to develop the IT systems for the electoral bonds scheme.
The group said that Subhash Chandra Garg, who was the Finance Secretary when the electoral bonds scheme was finalised, had in numerous interviews said that it should not take more than ten minutes to disclose information about the bonds.
“The SBI’s denying this information and indicating that it would not be available before the general elections seems to indicate that the SBI is shielding the Government in power from any criticism that there was a quid pro quo between the bonds and favours given to some firms or raids/intimidation to pressurize the corporates to fall in line,” it said.
The letter also cited a Newslaundry and The News Minute report that said that at least 30 companies between the financial years 2018-’19 and 2022-’23 donated nearly Rs 335 crore to the Bharatiya Janata Party and had also faced action from the central agencies during the same period.
“We note that the term of the present Lok Sabha is up to June 16, 2024, and to complete the election in time, the ECI could announce the schedule by March 27, or even earlier,” the letter said.
It urged the Election Commission to not announce the schedule for the 2024 general elections till the bank furnished the information.
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