SC refuses to stay Electoral bonds ahead of assembly polls

The Supreme Court refused to stay the sale and purchase of electoral bonds  in April ahead of the upcoming state assembly elections. The bench of CJI SA Bobde, AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramanian said since the bonds were allowed to be released in 2018 and 2019 without interruption, and sufficient safeguards are there, there is no justification to stay the electoral bonds at present. The bonds can now be issued from April 1, the court said. It rejected an NGO's plea seeking a stay on their scheduled sale between April 1 and April 10. The plea also wanted them banned till matters related to parties' funding and transparency of incomes were sorted out.

The electoral bonds scheme was challenged in September 2017 by the Communist Party of India (Marxist) or the CPI-M, and two non-governmental organisations (NGOs) — Association for Democratic Reforms (ADR) and Common Cause.Appearing for ADR, Senior Advocate Prashant Bhushan had argued that the bonds had turned into a tool for receiving bribes in the garb of donations. He also cited the banking regulator's misgivings about it: "The RBI has said that this system of bonds is a type of weapon or medium for financial scams." The bonds were proof of the government's real approach to black money as opposed to its official stance, he said. The court, however, responded to such doubts saying it is not only the ruling party that is always the beneficiary of such transactions. Chief Justice Sharad A Bobde told Bhushan that his arguments came across as related more to the political morality of the instrument. "Hasn't the Supreme Court already gone through such arguments already," the Chief Justice asked.