Guwahati: The Supreme Court of India has named the five judges who will hear petitions challenging the legality of the electoral bonds scheme on October 31, 2023.
The scheme allows anonymous donations to political parties, which has raised concerns about transparency and corruption.
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The five-judge Constitution Bench will be headed by Chief Justice of India DY Chandrachud and will include Justices Sanjiv Khanna, BR Gavai, J.B. Pardiwala, and Manoj Misra.
The Court has agreed to the petitioners’ plea urging it to focus primarily on two issues concerning the electoral bonds scheme.
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The first is the legalization of anonymous donations to political parties.
The second one is the violation of citizens’ right to information about the funding of political parties, promoting corruption.
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These two issues concern the violation of Articles 19, 14, and 21 of the Constitution, as per the petitioners.
The electoral bonds scheme was passed as a Money Bill in 2017, circumventing the Rajya Sabha.
This means that the Bill could not be amended by the Rajya Sabha and could only be passed or rejected in its entirety.
The petitioners in the case argue that the electoral bonds scheme has opened the floodgates to unlimited political donations and has made it difficult to track who is funding political parties.
They also argued that the scheme violates citizens’ right to know who is funding the political parties they vote for.