Will bring back electoral bonds after wider consultations, says Nirmala Sitharaman

Union Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman said on Friday that the Bharatiya Janata Party will bring back electoral bonds, declared unconstitutional by the Supreme Court, in some form after wider consultations if voted back to power in the Lok Sabha elections, the Hindustan Times reported.

The scheme was struck down by a five-judge bench of the Supreme Court on February 15 on the grounds that it violated voters’ right to information and could lead to quid pro quo arrangements between donors and political parties.

Sitharaman on Friday said that the Centre has not yet decided on whether to file a review petition against the judgement.

“We still have to do a lot of consultation with stakeholders and see what is it that we have to do to make or bring in a framework which will be acceptable to all, primarily retain the level of transparency and completely remove the possibility of black money entering into this,” she said in an interview with the Hindustan Times.

The finance minister claimed that the electoral bonds scheme had brought in transparency, and that what prevailed before it “was just free-for-all”.

Sitharaman echoed the claims made by Prime Minister Narendra Modi on April 15 during an interview with ANI, in which he contended that it was because of electoral bonds that a money trail could be...

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