Nitin Gadkari backs electoral bond scheme, says ‘contesting elections requires money’

livemint.com:

Electoral Bond Scheme developed when the late Arun Jaitley was India's finance minister, saying scrapping this plan will attract black money. Gadkari, in an interview with NDTV, said the main purpose of the electoral bond scheme was that political parties would get money through it which would help push the economy to number one, pointing toward Prime Minister Narendra Modi's aim on the economic front. “What's wrong with this idea? Every party needs that money for contesting elections," he questioned while refusing to comment on the Supreme Court verdict on the electoral bond scheme.

Referring to black money, Gadkari said, “People will take money as ‘number two’ if you will not allow bonds." Here are top 10 updates on electoral bonds row, 1) Former Chhattisgarh Chief Minister Bhupesh Baghel called it the “biggest scam of the year". “The BJP senses that it is losing the Lok Sabha elections and was, hence, resorting to newer tactics against the Opposition," he told media persons. 2) “Out of ₹20000 crore worth Electoral Bonds, ₹6000 crore have been donated to the BJP while the rest went to opposition parties," BJP leader RP Singh said as quoted by ANI. 3) Gadkari stated that the electoral bond would be purchased by wealthy people.

“Those wealthy would be contractors. Or have made it big in trade or industry. So it is not right to link it to that (quid pro quo)," he told NDTV. 4) According to the recent data released by the EC, the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) at the Centre has received the most money through these bonds, totaling ₹6,986.5 crore since they were introduced in 2018.