SC verdict on electoral bonds: Congress hopes govt will stop resorting to 'such mischievous ideas'

The Congress on Thursday welcomed the Supreme Court verdict striking down the electoral bonds scheme and said that it will reinforce the power of votes over notesThe opposition party also said that it hopes that the Modi Government will stop resorting to such mischievous ideas in the future and listen to the Supreme Court so that democracy transparency and levelplaying field persistThe Supreme Court in a landmark judgement delivered a big blow to the government and annulled the electoral bonds scheme for political funding saying it violates the Constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression as well as the right to informationIn a post on X Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge welcomed the Supreme Court decision and hoped the government will stop resorting to such mischievous ideas in the futureHe said the Congress had called the scheme opaque and undemocratic when it was launched Subsequently in the 2019 manifesto the Congress promised to scrap the Modi governments dubious schemeWe welcome the decision of the Supreme Court today which has struck down this Black Money Conversion scheme of the Modi Government calling it UnconstitutionalWe remember how the Modi Govt PMO and FM bulldozed every institution RBI Election Commission Parliament and Opposition to fill BJPs coffers No wonder 9537 of the funding under this scheme was received by BJP Kharge saidWe hope that Modi Government will stop resorting to such mischievous ideas in future and listens to the Supreme Court so that democracy transparency and levelplaying field persists the Congress chief saidReacting to the verdict former Congress president Rahul Gandhi said Another proof of Narendra Modis corrupt policies is in front of you The BJP had made electoral bonds a medium for taking bribe and commission Today a stamp has been put on thisCongress general secretary Jairam Ramesh said The Supreme Court has held the muchtouted Electoral Bonds scheme of the Modi Sarkar as violative of both laws passed by Parliament as well as the Constitution of IndiaThe longawaited verdict is hugely welcome and will reinforce the power of votes over notes he said on XThe Modi Sarkar has been inflicting ANYAY upon ANYAY on the Annadatas while privileging the Chandadatas Ramesh saidWe also hope that the Supreme Court will take note that Election Commission has been consistently refusing to even meet political parties on the issue of Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail VVPAT If everything is transparent in the voting process then why this obstinacy he saidParty spokesperson Pawan Khera said at a press conference here that the Congress has been fighting this battle for the last seven years both within Parliament and outside and its stand has been vindicatedWe welcome the judgment of the Honble Supreme Court he told reportersWe are grateful to the Supreme Court of India We as a nation stand strengthened and encouraged Khera said and added that Today we stand vindicatedKhera charged that the electoral bonds were a wilful tool of concealment of absolute exoneration from political accountabilityThat was their only purpose and all the intellectualisations offered at the time have failed to withstand judicial scrutiny he notedFor a party which made the purging of Black Money a key jumla of its electoral campaigns it created a system that removed all accountability from the system allowed black money a cloak to conceal itself with while at the same time charging the citizens of this country to run it he saidKhera said the party looks forward to the SBI disclosing all the details of funding received by all political parties and the ECI publishing the same in compliance with the Supreme Courts directionsWith over 95 percent of all funding having flowed to just one single party through this route since it was introduced the question that arises is will the Modi Government comply or will it issue another ordinance to try and circumvent the directions of the Supreme Court Khera askedKhera alleged that Prime Minister Narendra Modi has been exposed with his corruption coming to the fore in light of the verdictThis is a case of corruption by the prime minister which was attempted to be coveredup legally by bringing a money bill the Congress leader claimedHe claimed that the government has a habit of taking recourse to ordinance for having its way and said that after the verdict no attempt should be made to bring back the electoral bonds through the back doorAsked if the party would demand a probe into donations received by the BJP through the bonds Khera said I think this is something so serious that heads should roll Who is behind this scheme which covers all tracks which ensures a totally opaque system of political funding The accountability must be fixed The country should know who is behind this corruption and we all know who is behind this corruptionSenior Congress leader and former finance minister P Chidambaram also hailed the verdict saying it is a great victory for transparency the right to know and level playing field in electionsIn its verdict months ahead of the Lok Sabha polls the apex court ordered the SBI to disclose to the EC the names of the contributors to the sixyearold schemeThis story has been sourced from a third party syndicated feed agencies Midday accepts no responsibility or liability for its dependability trustworthiness reliability and data of the text Midday managementmiddaycom reserves the sole right to alter delete or remove without notice the content in its absolute discretion for any reason whatsoever