Rahul Gandhi claims that Electoral Bonds were the largest form of extortion in the world, orchestrated by Prime Minister Modi.
NEW DELHI: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday claimed that electoral bonds was the biggest extortion racket in world. “Funds for splitting political parties and toppling opposition governments came from electoral bonds,” Rahul said at a rally in Maharashtra’s Thane. He claimed that there was no connection between contracts given by Congress governments in states and electoral bonds.
A long time ago, the leader of our country came up with a plan to make politics in India better. He said that companies could give money to political parties without anyone knowing who they were. But now it seems like this plan is actually a way for the government to take money from big companies and make them do what they want. It’s like stealing money and making companies give it to a specific political party called BJP. Rahul believes this is not fair and is trying to tell people about it.
The opposition parties have trained its guns at the BJP, a day after Election Commission displayed details of electoral bonds on its website on the orders of the Supreme Court.
Electoral Bonds Data Live updates: The Election Commission of India (ECI) released the list of entities involved in the sales and purchase of contentious electoral bonds on Thursday. The ECI made the data public on its website following the Supreme Court’s order. The top court on Tuesday had directed the Election Commission to publish details of the now-scrapped electoral bonds and political parties that redeemed them on Thursday. The State Bank of India (SBI) submitted the data on electoral bonds to the electoral panel body on 12 March after the SC rejected its plea to give the bank the more time to submit details. The SC in its February order gave a landmark judgement by scrapping the Electoral Bonds scheme. The court called it “unconstitutional”.
Electoral Bonds Data Live: Electoral bonds was world’s biggest extortion racket, says Rahul Gandhi
Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Friday termed the scrapped electoral bonds scheme brought in by the BJP-led Union government as the “biggest extortion racket in the world.”
The funds amassed through the scheme were used to split political parties and topple opposition governments, he alleged at a press conference here, a day after data pertaining to the scheme was made public following Supreme Court directions.
There was no correlation between the electoral bonds and the contracts given by Congress or other opposition parties’ governments in states, said Gandhi, whose Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra is in Maharashtra in its last leg.
Electoral Bonds Data Live: ₹1-cr bonds take lion’s share at 96%; ₹1k bonds just 0.0001%
Corporate donations worth thousands of crores to political parties through now-scrapped electoral bonds may have hit the headlines, but there were also 132 such bonds of just ₹1,000 each bought by individuals as well as corporates, including behemoth ITC Ltd.
Together, these bonds were worth ₹1.32 lakh, accounting for a minuscule 0.0001 per cent of the total value of 18,871 bonds worth ₹12,155 crore, details of which have been made public by the Election Commission of India.
On the other hand, as many as 11,671 bonds of the highest ₹1 crore denomination were purchased in nearly a four-year period beginning April 12, 2019, and they accounted for a whopping 96 per cent of the overall value of all such bonds bought for making donations to various political parties.
Electoral Bonds Data Live: BJP received funds from firms raided by ED, alleges AAP leader Saurabh Bharadwaj
Aam Aadmi Party challenged the BJP to disclose the details of overall funds it got through these bonds, and accused it of receiving proceeds of crime from companies under probe by the ED.
Delhi cabinet minister Saurabh Bharadwaj asked if the BJP would accept receiving funds from companies that were attached by the Enforcement Directorate in connection with money laundering.
“The Bharatiya Janata Party received over ₹6,000 crore in the form of electoral bonds, the biggest share than any other party. Why was the BJP not revealing how much funds they have received.
“These companies bought the electoral bonds after they were raided by the ED. This means the proceeds of crime have gone to the Centre via the electoral bonds,” Bharadwaj alleged as he read out names of companies raided by the ED.
Electoral Bonds Data Live: No link between ED raids and political donations to ruling party, says Nirmala Sitharaman
Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman on Friday denied any link between the functioning of investigative agencies, including ED raids, and electoral funding to the ruling party, saying these allegations are just assumptions.
“What if the companies gave the money, and after that, we still went and knocked at their doors through ED (Enforcement Directorate). Is that a probability or not…It is an assumption that the ED went and knocked at their doors, and to save themselves they came up with funds.
The second assumption is that are you sure that they have given (electoral bonds) to BJP. What if they probably gave to regional parties,” she said while speaking at India Today Conclave.