A vote for disclosure

Scrapping electoral bonds is an opportunity for reform

A five-judge Constitutional Bench of the Supreme Court has injected much-needed transparency into electoral funding in India by striking down the six-year-old electoral bond scheme for political contributions, ruling it violative of the right to information embedded in Article 19(1)(a) of the Constitution. In doing so, the majority court ruling has upheld the values of open and transparent governance and access to information for voters that had been infringed upon by this secretive campaign finance law. To this end, the apex court has instructed State Bank of India, the designated state-owned bank issuing these bonds, to give details of the