Congress to Make Corruption in Sale of Electoral Bonds Major Poll Plank

Graft in the sale of electoral bonds would be the Congres poll plank, said AICC secretary in-charge of Karnataka Abhishek Dutt. Targeting the saffron party leaders, he pointed out that nepotism in the party is evident as wards of many leaders have been allocated tickets. Is this not Parivarvad? Abhishek Dutt questioned the saffron party while speaking to ETV Bharat's Amit Agnihotri.

New Delhi:The Congress on Friday said that corruption in the sale of electoral bonds would be a major plank of the grand old party to target the BJP ahead of the Lok Sabha polls. “It is time for the PM to walk the talk. He came to power in 2014 on the promise of providing clean governance and ending dynastic politics. However, it seems he has forgotten his promises.

There is corruption involved in the sale of electoral bonds and the BJP has been the major beneficiary of electoral bonds. If you see the BJP’s lists for forthcoming Lok Sabha polls, nepotism is evident as many sons and daughters of senior leaders have been allocated tickets. Is this not Parivarvad? These are going to be our major poll planks,” AICC secretary in-charge of Karnataka Abhishek Dutt told ETV Bharat.

“The SBI was trying to delay submitting electoral bonds data to the Election Commission, but did so on a day when it was pulled up by the Supreme Court. The SBI has still not furnished the entire data and has been warned by the apex court. There are clear linkages between donors of electoral bonds and the BJP. Several of the donors gave money after they were raided by central agencies,” he said. According to the AICC functionary, people had to realise that democracy was very sensitive.

“In the past, the Delhi government headed by then Chief Minister Sushma Swaraj could not win the people's trust and was defeated in the polls over high prices of onions. Today, there is a situation where the central agencies are used to break elected opposition governments and threaten opposition leaders with false cases,” said Dutt.

Party insiders said the BJP had targeted the previous UPA regime over false allegations of corruption in the allocation of 2G spectrum and coal blocks in 2014, but later the courts found nothing in those charges. “The BJP targets us with Parivarvad, but see many wards of senior leaders have been given tickets for the forthcoming polls. Sushma Swaraj’s daughter has been given a ticket from Delhi, but what is her contribution to the party,” said Dutt.

According to AICC secretary-in-charge of Gujarat BM Sandeep Kumar, the SBI has not furnished complete data on the electoral bonds as a large tranche of such bonds was purchased in 2018, but the bank has supplied data only from 2019. “Bonds worth Rs 2,500 crore were sold in 2018. That data should also be made public for a complete picture as to who was the beneficiary. The Supreme Court order asking the SBI to furnish identification numbers to match the donors with the recipient political party is a welcome step. It will bring more transparency in the system,” Sandeep Kumar told ETV Bharat.

“Our leader Rahul Gandhi had said five years ago electoral bonds were a kind of bribes in new India. Now, the data released by the SBI via the Election Commission shows that there was a give-and-take between the BJP and the donors. The bank must have been under pressure to delay the data release while our accounts have been blocked. We will take this message to the people,” he pointed out.