NEW DELHI, Oct 30: Congress leader P Chidambaram has accused the BJP of raising funds from big corporates in an “opaque, secretive and conspiratorial manner” through the electoral bond scheme. The BJP reacted saying the scheme promotes transparency and democratic political funding, a day before a 5-judge Constitution Bench examines its validity on Tuesday.
Chidambaram’s attack on BJP came after Attorney General R Venkataramani told the Supreme Court that the citizens do not have the right to know about the source of funds under Article 19(1)(a).
In a post on X, Chidambaram said, “The BJP has made its intentions clear, to raise its funds from big corporates in an opaque, secretive and conspiratorial manner.” He said the answer to this is transparent crowd-funding from small donors through recordable digital transactions. “Let us see who wins: the Big corporates or the small citizens who takes pride in contributing to a political party.
BJP IT department head Amit Malviya said: “Unlike the completely opaque system of cash donations that you are fond of, electoral bonds demand that donors disclose in their accounts the amount of bonds purchased. Every political party has to then declare these donations to the election commission.”
The scheme, notified by the government on January 2, 2018, was pitched as an alternative to cash donations made to political parties as part of efforts to bring transparency to the political funding. The scheme envisages any citizen or entity incorporated and set up in India can buy the bonds, either singly or jointly with other individuals.
