After March 2021, a division bench of the Supreme Court will hear the plea challenging the electoral bonds scheme today. The plea has been pending since 2017.

 The Supreme Court of India is slated to hear pleas challenging the electoral bonds scheme today.A division bench of Justice BR Gavai and Justice BV Nagarathna is set to take up the case.Earlier in April, the case was mentioned before a bench led by former Chief Justice of India NV Ramana. The former CJI had said that the case would have been listed, had the pandemic not hit the country.

Despite the bench agreeing to hear the pleas, it had not been listed until today.The case was last heard in March 2021 when a bench led by the then CJI SA Bobde refused to entertain an application filed in the case. The plea sought a stay on the electoral bonds scheme ahead of assembly elections in some states.

A batch of pleas was filed before the Supreme Court in 2017 by the Association for Democratic Reforms and others alleging the bonds allow a funding system which goes unchecked by any authority and has affected transparency in political funding.

The court refused to stay the scheme, observing that the Scheme was introduced in 2018 and the bonds had been released at periodical intervals in 2018, 2019 and 2020 without any impediment. The court also said that certain safeguards have already been provided by this Court in its interim order dated April 12, 2019.

In the said order, a bench led by the then CJI Ranjan Gogoi had observed that the rival contentions gave rise to weighty issues which have a tremendous bearing on the sanctity of the electoral process in the country and would require an in-depth hearing.

As an interim direction, the court directed all the political parties who have received donations through electoral bonds to submit details of donations to the Election Commission of India in a sealed cover.It included detailed particulars of the donors as against each bond, the amount of each such bond and the full particulars of the credit received against each bond, the particulars of the bank account to which the amount has been credited and the date of each such credit.

The pleas have challenged amendments brought by the Finance Act 2017 to the Reserve Bank of India Act, Companies Act, Income Tax Act, Representation of Peoples Act and Foreign Contributions Regulations Act to make way for electoral bonds.