Future Gaming top donor for DMK, shows EC's new data on electoral bonds

New Delhi [India], March 17 : Lottery king Santiago Martin's Future Gaming was the biggest purchaser of electoral bonds at Rs 1,368 crore, of which nearly 37 per cent went to the DMK, the Election Commission data showed on Sunday.
The company donated Rs 509 crore to Tamil Nadu's ruling party, Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK), through the electoral bond. Other major donors of the MK Stalin-led DMK included Megha Engineering Rs 105 crore, India Cements Rs 14 crore and Sun TV Rs 100 crore.
The Election Commission on Sunday released data received from political parties on electoral bonds, which it had given to the Supreme Court in sealed covers.
These details are for the period before April 12, 2019. Electoral bond details after this date were made public by the EC last week.
As per the data, the BJP received the maximum funds through these bonds at Rs 6,986.5 crore since they were introduced in 2018, followed by West Bengal's ruling party Trinamool Congress (Rs 1,397 crore), Congress (Rs 1,334 crore) and BRS (Rs 1,322 crore).
The JD(S) received bonds worth Rs 89.75 crore, including Rs 50 crore from Megha Engineering, the second-largest purchaser of electoral bonds.
Odisha's ruling party BJD was the fourth largest recipient at Rs 944.5 crore followed by DMK at Rs 656.5 crore and Andhra Pradesh's ruling party YSR Congress nearly Rs 442.8 crore.
The TDP redeemed bonds worth Rs 181.35 crore, Shiv Sena Rs 60.4 crore, RJD 56 crore, Samajwadi Party got Rs 14.05 crore via electoral bonds, Akali Dal Rs 7.26 crore and National Conference Rs 50 lakh.
The CPI(M) has declared that it did not receive funds through electoral bonds, while filings made by the AIMIM and BSP showed nil receipts.
"The Election Commission of India has today uploaded the data received in digitized form from the registry of the Supreme Court on electoral bonds on its website," the poll panel said in a statement.
The ECI had submitted it in the sealed covers to the Supreme Court and was later asked to put them in the public domain.
"Data so received from political parties was deposited in the Supreme Court without opening sealed covers. In pursuance of the Supreme Court's order dated March 15, 2024, the Registry of the Supreme Court has returned physical copies along with a digitized record of the same in a pen drive in a sealed cover," the poll panel said.
The Supreme Court, in a ruling in February, struck down the Centre's Electoral Bond Scheme, which allowed for anonymous funding to political parties, and ordered the SBI to stop issuing Electoral Bonds immediately.
It had asked SBI to furnish details of each electoral bond encashed by parties, including the date of encashment and the denomination of the bond.
On Monday, the top court dismissed an application of SBI seeking an extension of time till June 30 to submit details of electoral bonds to the Election Commission, asking the bank to disclose the details by March 12.
The apex court also directed the poll panel to compile the information to be furnished by the SBI and publish the details on its official website no later than March 15, 2024, by 5 pm.
Under the system, a person or company could buy electoral bonds from the government-owned State Bank of India and donate them to a political party.