The Supreme Court noted that there are “sufficient safeguards”, and thus “there is no justification to stay the electoral bonds at present”.
The Apex Court today refused to stay the release of the fresh set of electoral bonds from April 1 for the assembly polls in five states, i.e. West Bengal, Kerala, Tamil Nadu, Assam and Puducherry.
The Supreme Court dismissed the application filed by NGO Association for Democratic Reforms seeking stay of the bonds.
“Since the bonds were allowed to be released in 2018 and 2019 without interruption, and sufficient safeguards are there, there is no justification to stay the electoral bonds at present”, the Court said in its order, LiveLaw reported.
An NGO ‘Association for Democratic Reforms’ had filed an application, in which the bench comprising of Chief Justice of India SA Bobde, Justices AS Bopanna and V Ramasubramaniam had reserved order on Wednesday.
Advocate Prashant Bhushan represented the petitioner, in a argument with Attorney General for India KK Venugopal, Solicitor General Tushar Mehta and Senior Advocate Rakesh Dwivedi representing the Election Comission of India.
The Election Commission of India opposed the stay of electoral bonds. The ECI stressed that they are not opposed to electoral bonds, but want more transparency. But Electoral Bonds is one step ahead unaccounted cash system, ECI said. The ECI also suggested that the issue of transparency can be considered at the final argument stage, and there should be no interim stay.
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