Sibal pointed out that with the judgment, the earlier law restricting corporate donations to a maximum of 10 per cent of a company’s average profit of the last years would stand reinstated.
Further, such disclosures would have to be done in accordance with the Representation of People Act, he explained.
However, he points out that the problem of corporations not wishing to disclose who they are funding as they need favours from the government persists.
“If a quid pro quo is established with the donor and the government having given some advantage to donor, then it is a corrupt practice under the Representation of People Act. Therefore, corporations are wary of opening up information. But the fact of the matter is if you want to fund political parties and have free and fair elections, you cannot have electoral bonds.”
He suggests that a way out would be for corporate donations to be redistributed to parties proportionally in Parliament, rather than ruling parties getting the lion’s share.
“You cannot have one system through which one political party ruling at the Centre is giving out goodies and aggrandises 50 per cent of the bonds. They have 5,000 to 6,000 crores in the process. They have set up their offices, given to the RSS and nothing to do with election. This is a bond which seeks to bond the donor with political parties.”
Source: Barandbench
