Congress says 'desperate' Modi govt is clutching on straws as SBI moves SC on electoral bonds

The Congress on Tuesday attacked the Centre over the State Bank of India moving the Supreme Court to seek more time to disclose electoral bond details alleging that the Modi government is using the largest bank of the country as a shield to hide its dubious dealingsThe State Bank of India SBI on Monday moved the Supreme Court seeking an extension till June 30 to disclose details of each electoral bond encashed by political parties In its verdict last month the top court directed the SBI to furnish the details to the poll panel by March 6Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge said the Congress position on the electoral bonds scheme is that it is opaque undemocratic and destroyed the level playing fieldModi government is using the largest bank of our country as a shield to hide its dubious dealings through Electoral Bonds he saidNo less than the Supreme Court of India had struck down Modi governments black money conversion scheme of Electoral Bonds holding it unconstitutional violative of RTI and illegal and asking SBI to furnish donor details by March 6 he saidBut the BJP wants it to be done after Lok Sabha elections The tenure of this Lok Sabha will end on 16th June and SBI wants to share the data by 30th June Kharge saidThe BJP is the main beneficiary of this fraudulent scheme he allegedIsnt the government conveniently hiding the BJPs shady dealings where contracts of highways ports airports power plants etc were handed over to Prime Minister Narendra Modis cronies in lieu of these opaque electoral bonds he askedExperts say that the 44434 automated data entries of donors can be divulged and matched in just 24 hours Why does the SBI then need 4 more months to collate this information he saidCongress party was crystal clear that the Electoral Bonds scheme was opaque undemocratic and destroyed level playing field But the Modi government PMO and FM bulldozed every institution RBI Election Commission Parliament and Opposition to fill BJPs coffers Kharge allegedNow a desperate Modi Govt clutching on straws is trying to use SBI to bulldoze the Supreme Courts judgement he saidCongress MP Manish Tewari also hit out at the government and urged the Supreme Court to not allow SBIs plea Supreme Court should not allow TheOfficialSBI to get away with its chicanery on Electoral Bonds Tewari said on XPeople before the General Elections must know who got what from whom amp whether there was any primafacie quid pro quo involved he saidThe Supreme Court must order lifting of the corporate veil of SPVs called electoral trusts to reveal the true identity of the donor Tewari saidCongress leader Rahul Gandhi had on Monday slammed the government over the issue terming it a lastditch attempt before the Lok Sabha polls to hide Prime Minister Narendra Modis real faceIn a post in Hindi on X Gandhi had said Narendra Modi has put his entire force in order to hide the donation businessWhen the Supreme Court has stated that it is the right of the people of the country to know the truth about electoral bonds then why does the SBI not want this information to be made public before the elections the former Congress chief had saidIn an application filed before the top court SBI contended that retrieval of information from each silo and the procedure of matching the information of one silo to that of the other would be a timeconsuming exerciseThe plea submitted that due to stringent measures undertaken to ensure that the identity of the donors was kept anonymous decoding the electoral bonds and matching donors to the donations made would be a complex processIt is submitted that the data related to the issuance of the bond and the data related to the redemption of the bond was kept recorded in two different silos No central database was maintained This was done to ensure that donors anonymity would be protectedIt is submitted that donor details were kept in a sealed cover at the designated branches and all such sealed covers were deposited in the main branch of the applicant bank which is located in Mumbai the plea saidIn a landmark judgement that delivered a big blow to the government the Supreme Court on February 15 annulled the electoral bonds scheme for political funding saying it violates the Constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression as well as the right to informationIn its verdict months ahead of the Lok Sabha polls the apex court ordered SBI to disclose to the Election Commission the names of the contributors to the sixyearold schemeA fivejudge Constitution bench headed by Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud directed that the SBI must disclose details of each electoral bond encashed by political parties The information should include the date of encashment and the denomination of the bonds and be submitted to the poll panel by March 6This story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text 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