CPM To Approach Supreme Court A Second Time; To Seek An Immediate Stay On Opaque Electoral Bonds Scheme

Communist Party of India (Marxist) General Secretary Sitaram Yechury has stated that his party plans to approach the Supreme Court a second time to seek an “immediate stay order” on the Electoral Bonds scheme.

Incidentally, the CPM is so far the only political party which has already filed a petition in the Supreme Court seeking a stay on the electoral bonds scheme, though the court is yet to pass a final order in the matter.

According to Yechury, the electoral bonds scheme legalizes political corruption and it is “completely unaccountable” because except for the banks and the government, nobody would know which corporates or business houses purchased electoral bonds, unless the parties themselves declare it.

Hence, the entire process of donations by corporate houses to political parties would remain unclear as to which political party collected these amounts, making it opaque, anonymous and controversial.

He stated that the recent Supreme Court verdict against the central government in the Finance Bill 2017 case has given the CPM an additional reason to approach the Supreme Court once again.

This is because it was through the Finance Bill 2017 that the BJP-led central government had passed its Electoral Bonds scheme.

He stated that the CPM’s primary focus would be on trying to get an immediate stay on the operation of electoral bonds from the Supreme Court before the final disposal of the case because setting up a constitution bench would take some time.

Yechury stated that, while the Finance Bill 2017 was being passed, he had demanded that he had raised the matter in parliament and said that this matter must be taken to the court for clarification.

He stated that he had also demanded that Section 110(3) of Finance Bill 2017 must be scrapped because the constitution clearly defines what can be a money bill and what cannot be a money bill.

He stated that Clause 1 and Clause 2 of Article 110 of the Indian constitution clearly define what can and cannot be termed as a “money bill”. It is Clause 3 of Article 110 of the Indian constitution which permits the speaker of the Lok Sabha to decide what’s a ‘money bill’ whenever there is a confusion, which is being “misused” and must hence be “scrapped”, Yechury stated.

In this connection, it may be noted that previously unpublished government documents, obtained by transparency activist Commodore Lokesh Batra (Retired) seem to prove that the Prime Minister’s Office directed the union finance ministry to break its own rules to approve unscheduled and illegal sale of electoral bonds for state assembly elections at least on two separate occasions.

It has also been reported that the electoral bond scheme was implemented over fervent objections from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) and the Election Commission of India.