Transparency in poll funding could lead to a national clean-up
₹50,000 crore. Money power cannot guarantee electoral success, so it becomes a race to the bottom. Even Ambedkar had identified this malaise.
Till we figure out a way out of this fruitless race, and how to curtail poll expenditure, we must at least shine a spotlight on the funds trail. A necessary reform is to reduce the influence of illegitimate money on elections. How to bring the money in from the shadows, that is.
Electoral bonds introduced in Parliament in 2017 were supposed to be a step in that direction. If the scheme had included complete transparency—who is funding whom and how much, and with a digital trail—it would indeed have been a step in the right direction. Expressing its opinion, the Reserve Bank of India had asked for a digital-only mode for these transfers.
It instead became an anonymous bearer bond scheme, with voters left with no clue or right to know. Anonymity is the opposite of transparency. It also caused an asymmetry, since a government-owned bank had knowledge but not anyone else.
No wonder the Supreme Court declared the scheme unconstitutional. We need at least two major steps in political funding reforms. The first is transparency of both donors and receivers.
Who is giving money to whom? Let voters know and then decide. The second and more important step is to reduce the overall influence of money itself on electoral outcomes. Noam Chomsky, the noted political theorist, had said that the 2016 elections in the United States were a watershed event, not because of the rise of Donald Trump, but because of the rise of Bernie Sanders.
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