Today, the Supreme Court referred to a five-judge Constitution bench a batch of pleas challenging the validity of the electoral bond scheme for political funding of parties.

A bench consisting of Chief Justice D Y Chandrachud and Justices J B Pardiwala and Manoj Misra said that they have received an application requesting that, due to its urgency, the case be referred to a larger bench for a final and definitive judgment.

The bench announced that the case would be scheduled for consideration on the previously set hearing date of October 30.

"In view of the importance of issue raised, and with regard to Article 145(4) of the Constitution of India, the matter be placed before a bench of at least five judges. The matter will be retained on October 30, 2023," he said.

Electoral bonds were introduced through the Finance Act, 2017, which in turn amended three other statutes - the RBI Act, the Income Tax Act and the Representation of People Act - to enable the introduction of such bonds.

The 2017 Finance Act introduced a system by which electoral bonds could be issued by any scheduled bank for the purpose of electoral funding.

Earlier, the bench had taken note of the submissions of lawyer Prashant Bhushan who asserted that the matter required adjudication before the commencement of the electoral bond scheme for the 2024 general elections. In response, the bench had decided to schedule it for a final hearing.

There are four Public Interest Litigations (PILs) currently awaiting resolution on this matter. In March, one of the PIL petitioners had stated that a total of ₹12,000 crore had been funneled to political parties through electoral bonds, with two-thirds of this substantial sum being attributed to a single major political party.

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