Article By Raghavendra Rao
(20 March 2024)
The Supreme Court has asked the State Bank of India to provide all the information related to electoral bonds by March 21.
This information also includes the alpha-numeric code, which will help in knowing which political party redeemed the bond given by which buyer.
The data released so far by the State Bank of India tells only two things:
The first is that who bought bonds worth how much rupees on which date and the second is that which political party redeemed how many bonds on which date.
But it is not clear which political party got the buyer’s bond.
After getting the information about the alpha-numeric code, this matching can be done easily.
Why are questions being raised?
By analyzing the data released in the first batch of the SBI disclosures, even before the information about alpha-numeric code was available, several patterns have been seen.
Here are some patterns due to which the Electoral Bond Scheme is being called the biggest scam in the country so far.
If we carefully look at the data available till now, there are many such examples where in any year a private company was raided by the Enforcement Directorate (ED) or the Income Tax Department and a few days later that company purchased electoral bonds.
There are also instances in which a company purchased electoral bonds a few days after it was raided; and after that the company again purchased electoral bonds.
In some cases, there are also allegations that sometime after purchasing the electoral bonds, a private company got a big government project.
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi wrote on social media platform:
Calling it a criminal game, Rahul Gandhi said that in this game “one side gave the contract, the other side took the cut” and “one side raided, the other side took donations.”
Gandhi further said that the investigating agencies like ED, Income Tax and CBI are working as recovery agents.
On March 18, Karnataka Medical Education Minister Sharan Prakash Patil said that the purchase of electoral bonds by several corporate houses and business entities soon after the raids by central agencies like ED and IT department is not a mere coincidence.
Before talking about this analysis, let us make it clear that the things emerging in these patterns are the subject of an official investigation.
Many of these things will also become clear when the relationship between the political party encashing the buyer’s bond is made clear due to the alpha-numeric code.
So let’s take a look at some companies and events related to them:
- Future Gaming & Hotel Services Pvt Ltd
This company purchased electoral bonds worth Rs 1368 crore between October 2020 and January 2024.
On April 2, 2022, the Enforcement Directorate (ED) attached movable assets worth Rs 409.92 crore of this company in the lottery scam case.
On April 7, 2022, the company purchased electoral bonds worth Rs 100 crore.
On April 11, 2023, the company again purchased bonds worth Rs 60 crore.
On May 11 and 12, 2023, under the provisions of the Prevention of Money Laundering Act, the ED conducted searches at the residential premises in Chennai and business premises in Coimbatore of Future Gaming Chairman Santiago Martin and others. During the search, movable/immovable property worth about Rs 457 crore was recovered.
On July 6, 2023, the company again purchased electoral bonds worth Rs 62 crore.
- Torrent Power Limited
This company purchased electoral bonds worth Rs 106.5 crore between May 7, 2019 and January 10, 2024.
On March 7, 2024, the company said that it has received a contract from the Maharashtra State Electricity Distribution Company Limited to set up 306 MW solar projects worth Rs 1,540 crore under the PM-KUSUM scheme.
On January 9, 2024, this company had purchased bonds worth Rs 15 crore.
On January 10, 2024, the company purchased bonds worth Rs 10 crore.
- Yashoda Super Specialty Hospital
This company purchased electoral bonds worth Rs 162 crores between October 4, 2021 and October 11, 2023.
The Income Tax Department raided the company on 22 December 2020
This company started buying electoral bonds from 4 October 2021
- Aurobindo Pharma
This company purchased bonds worth Rs 51 crore between April 3, 2021 and November 8, 2023.
On November 10, 2022, company director P Sarath Chandra Reddy was arrested by ED in a money laundering case.
On November 15, 2022, the company purchased bonds worth Rs 5 crore.
In the year 2022, between January 5 and July 2, the company had also purchased bonds worth Rs 19.5 crore.
(Raghavendra Rao is BBC Correspondent)
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