Urban Mirror Correspondent
Lucknow March 15: The Lok Gathbandhan Party today asked the Election Commission to effectively stop flow of black money in the ensuing Lok Sabha elections. The LGP, reiterating its demand for the complete ban on political funding including though “electoral bonds”, said the privacy clause in the bond has failed to serve the purpose of ensuring transparency in electoral funding.
The spokesman of the LGP, headed by former Secretary Government of India Vijay Shankar Pandey, who is contesting Lok Sabha election from Faizabad, said that the NDA government affidavit in the Supreme Court justifying privacy of donor to political parties through electoral bond is flawed and the court should scrap it. The spokesman said the permission to even foreign companies to “invest” in political parties through electoral bonds is dangerous and fraught with the serious consequences. Pointing out that the electoral bond has helped largely the BJP, the spokesman said under the scheme the BJP got Rs 210 crore of the total Rs 215 bond issued in 2017-18. The spokesman said with corporate funding the possibility of cleaning the political system is impossible as inflow of ill-gotten money has become menace in fight against corruption. The election commission had even found the mode of donation through bond opaque, the spokesman commented.
The spokesman said that elimination of corruption and restoration of transparency in country’s political system is unlikely to be achieved without complete ban on political funding by the corporate houses. The spokesman said large number of corporate houses, both inside and outside the country, have been donating huge funds to parties, especially ruling party to serve their vested interest. The spokesman said this state of affair is not good for honest, transparent and vibrant democracy. The spokesman said the functioning of various trusts constituted by the corporate houses for such funding is also opaque.
The spokesman said political funding has over the decades become one of the major sources of converting black money into white. Expressing concern over circulation of huge black money in politics, the spokesman said political parties have unfortunately become one of the major conduits of money laundering for which strict legal action is urgently required to clean the system. The spokesman said the LGP, dedicated to honesty and transparency in public life, has been fighting for the eradication of the use of huge money in politics without which the concept of good governance is far-fetched.
