ABC.zip : 1315 attempts of Obfuscation by Election Commission
Yesterday afternoon Election Commission released another File "ABC.zip" in the same webpage where it was releasing the Electoral Bond data : Disclosure of electoral bonds
Godi Media and independent media started cherry picking some of those documents and started obfuscating the good data based investigations that had started .
I have downloaded and unzipped the files, those are communications between Election Commission Of India and all political parties, not only national Parties, but also, state level regional parties and even unrecognised unknown Political Outfits.
1315 files were in that zip files, structured (or burned) in folders named:
- box1
- box2
- Sealed Envelope (so some sealed envelopes can be opened and contents shared with public [Just not the rafale Envelope ])
Thereafter there are numerous subfolders and inside mostly are one page communications by most political Parties saying either that they have not received any Electoral Bonds or big parties saying how much Bonds they received but denying that they've any knowledge of any identity of the donor.
Well, there are some exceptions like DMK or J&K National Conference.. however it is important to remember, according to now struck down unconstitutional law, only SBI knew the data of real purchaser as parties had to depend on voluntary disclosure of Bond Donors, who themselves can be couriers or real purchasers.
Did Election Commission needed to disclose letters of hundreds of parties, who has never even received a single Electoral Bond ? No.
According to SBI, only 24 Political Parties received and encashed Electoral Bonds since 12th April 2019 and they are:
| Sl No. | Party Name (as given by SBI) | Party Acronym |
| 1 | BHARTIYA JANTA PARTY | BJP |
| 2 | ALL INDIA TRINAMOOL CONGRESS | AITMC |
| 3 | PRESIDENT, ALL INDIA CONGRESS COMMITTEE | Congress |
| 4 | BHARAT RASHTRA SAMITHI | BRS |
| 5 | BIJU JANATA DAL | BJD |
| 6 | DMK PARTY IN PARLIAMENT | DMK |
| 7 | YSR CONGRESS PARTY (YUVAJANA SRAMIKA R | YSR Congress |
| 8 | TELUGU DESAM PARTY | TDP |
| 9 | "SHIVSENA (POLITICAL PARTY)" and also "SHIVSENA" | SS |
| 10 | "RASHTRIYA JANTA DAL" and also "RASTRIYA JANTA DAL" | RJD |
| 11 | AAM AADMI PARTY | AAP |
| 12 | JANATA DAL ( SECULAR ) | JD(S) |
| 13 | SIKKIM KRANTIKARI MORCHA | SKM |
| 14 | "NATIONALIST CONGRESS PARTY MAHARASHTRA PRADESH" and also "NATIONALIST CONGRESS PARTY PARLIAMENT OF " |
NCP |
| 15 | JANASENA PARTY | JanaSena |
| 16 | ADYAKSHA SAMAJVADI PARTY | SP |
| 17 | BIHAR PRADESH JANTA DAL(UNITED) | JDU |
| 18 | JHARKHAND MUKTI MORCHA | JMM |
| 19 | SHIROMANI AKALI DAL | SAD |
| 20 | ALL INDIA ANNA DRAVIDA MUNNETRA KAZHAGAM | AIADMK |
| 21 | SIKKIM DEMOCRATIC FRONT | SDF |
| 22 | MAHARASHTRAWADI GOMNTAK PARTY | MGP |
| 23 | JAMMU AND KASHMIR NATIONAL CONFERENCE | J&K NC |
| 24 | GOA FORWARD PARTY | GFP |
I have taken the liberty of summarising those 20421 lines of encashed electoral bonds and arranging them in the order of money they encashed. If you want these party names in image format, I provide that below:
As you can see, State Bank of India who is extremely fussy about Individual's identity and its "KYC" protocols is quite laxed when it comes to Parties name! At least 3 parties name came with 2 different names and plenty more party names are replaced with office holder's title and sometimes even outright incomplete or incorrect.
But since only 24 parties encashed Electoral Bonds, so we managed to get their real names.
So Election Commission could have released just these 24 parties communications in a separate zip to make concerned citizens life a little less hard.
So which party recieved how much money:
I have that list also (I will be back with more analysis shortly)and here it is:
| Party Acronym | No of bonds encashed | Total Amount Encashed |
| BJP | 8633 | 60,605,111,000.00 |
| AITMC | 3305 | 16,095,314,000.00 |
| Congress | 3146 | 14,218,655,000.00 |
| BRS | 1806 | 12,147,099,000.00 |
| BJD | 861 | 7,755,000,000.00 |
| DMK | 648 | 6,390,000,000.00 |
| YSR Congress | 472 | 3,370,000,000.00 |
| TDP | 279 | 2,188,800,000.00 |
| SS | 355 | 1,593,814,000.00 |
| RJD | 150 | 735,000,000.00 |
| AAP | 245 | 654,500,000.00 |
| JD(S) | 75 | 435,000,000.00 |
| SKM | 50 | 365,000,000.00 |
| NCP | 121 | 310,000,000.00 |
| JanaSena | 39 | 210,000,000.00 |
| SP | 46 | 140,500,000.00 |
| JDU | 14 | 140,000,000.00 |
| JMM | 45 | 135,000,000.00 |
| SAD | 33 | 72,600,000.00 |
| AIADMK | 38 | 60,500,000.00 |
| SDF | 10 | 55,000,000.00 |
| MGP | 28 | 5,500,000.00 |
| J&K NC | 5 | 5,000,000.00 |
| GFP | 17 | 3,500,000.00 |
