‘Huge assumption to link ED searches with bond purchases’
Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday dismissed suggestions that electoral bonds were purchased by many corporates to “save themselves” from probe by investigative agencies, arguing that there was a probability that the bonds were either transferred to regional parties or were donated to the ruling party before the said probes began.
Speaking at The India Today Conclave2024, Ms. Sitharaman said it was a “huge assumption” that the money was given by firms after an Enforcement Directorate (ED) search. She was responding to a query whether bond purchases by 14 of the top 30 corporate electoral bond purchasers revealed so far, could be construed as a form of “protection” from probes they faced by some investigative agency.
“For all you know, that money was given earlier and yet, we went knocking at their door. Am I making sense? No?!... What if the companies gave the money and after that, we still went and knocked at their doors through the ED… Is that a probability or not?” the Minister said.
“Second assumption in that is, are you sure they have given it to the BJP? They probably gave it to the regional parties. What makes you assume so many things and build a narrative? The government has given and the State Bank has done its job as per the orders of the Supreme Court. Now you do any hair splitting on it, but do it without assumptions of this nature,” she emphasised, adding that “smart hardworking research will do good rather than lazy journalism”.
Stressing that she was not criticising the Supreme Court’s verdict on electoral bonds, Ms. Sitharaman admitted that the system was not perfect, but said her predecessor, the late Arun Jaitley, had brought this scheme as an improvement over the previous system of electoral funding. “A system which is not perfect from a system which was completely imperfect, was consciously brought in so at least one aspect of it would be cleaner. Now, in the wisdom of the Supreme Court, they thought this is not the way to go about it. Alright. Till a better system comes, what is there? We have returned to the old era that ‘do as you feel like —pay in cash, cheque, or give something else’,” she said.
Any future law on electoral funding must incorporate the lessons from this episode, she said, underlining that “transparency will have to be progressively better” than each earlier system.