SC scoffs at SBI plea for 3 months, fixes 24-hr deadline

NEW DELHI: Chastising the SBI, the Supreme Court on Monday ordered it to disclose the details of the electoral bonds encashed by political parties to the Election Commission by the close of business hours on March 12 and warned the country’s largest public sector lender that the court may proceed against it for “wilful disobedience” if it failed to comply with its directions and deadlines.

A five-judge constitution bench headed by Chief Justice DY Chandrachud, dismissing the State Bank of India’s plea seeking an extension of time till June 30 to disclose the details, also directed the EC to publish the information shared by the bank on its official website by 5 pm on March 15.

The order was passed by the bench, which also comprised Justices Sanjiv Khanna, BR Gavai, JB Pardiwala, and Manoj Misra.

In a landmark verdict delivered on February 15, the same five-judge constitution bench had scrapped the Centre’s controversial electoral bonds scheme that allowed anonymous political funding, calling it “unconstitutional”, and ordered disclosure by the EC of donors, the amount donated by them and the recipients by March 13.

Ordering the closure of the scheme, the top court directed the SBI, the authorised financial institution under the scheme, to submit by March 6 the details of the electoral bonds purchased since April 12, 2019 till date to the Election Commission.

Opposition leaders hailed the apex court’s order passed on Monday and said the country will soon come to know who donated to which party through electoral bonds.

With the SC decision, the country will soon come to know who donated to the BJP through electoral bonds. This is the first step in exposing corruption, scams and transactions of the Modi government

— Mallikarjun Kharge,

Congress president