India’s Top Supreme Court Scraps Electoral Bonds, Calls Them ‘Unconstitutional’

India’s top court has struck down a scheme that allowed people to make anonymous donations to political parties, calling it unconstitutional.

Electoral bonds were launched by Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government in 2018 to make political funding more transparent.

But critics say it’s done the opposite and made the process more opaque.

Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has received most of the funds through the bonds.

The scheme was challenged in the Supreme Court as a “distortion of democracy”.

On Thursday, a five-judge constitution bench ruled that electoral bonds violate citizens’ right to access information held by the government.

Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud said the Right to Information (RTI) law is “not confined to state affairs but also includes information necessary for participatory democracy”.

“Political parties are relevant units in the electoral process and information about funding of political parties is essential for electoral choices,” he added.

The court directed the government-run State Bank of India (SBI) to not issue any more such bonds, to provide identity details of those who bought them, and to give information about bonds redeemed by each political party to the Election Commission within a week.

It also observed that electoral bonds were not the only scheme to curb the use of cash or “black money” and asked the government to explore other alternatives.

“Citizens have a duty to hold the government accountable for their actions and inactions, and this can only happen if the government is open and not clothed in secrecy,” the court said.