BJP encashed Rs.1,700 crore before Lok Sabha 2019, already redeemed Rs.202 crore before 2024 polls

Of Rs 12,769 crore worth electoral bonds encashed by the political parties in the last five years, ruling BJP bagged almost half, and one-third of this came during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections. In fact, the party has encashed electoral bonds worth Rs.202 crore in January this year, ahead of the crucial 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

The electoral bond data released by the Election Commission of India on Thursday showed that the BJP encashed by far the highest amount of EBs (Rs.6,060.52 crore in total) among political parties. What the data also revealed was that the party redeemed the most during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections and the November 2023 elections in Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Chhattisgarh and Telangana.

One-third of the total amount that the party redeemed from April 12, 2019 till January 24 this year was during April and May 2019 (Rs.1,056.86 crore in April 2019 and Rs.714.71 crore in May 2019). During the latest Assembly elections in November 2023, the redemption increased to Rs.702 crore, from Rs.359.05 crore in October.

The BJP redeemed EBs throughout the period, in the form of 8,633 bonds. The redemption fell to single digits three times – February 2020 (Rs.3 crore), January 2021 (Rs.1.50 crore) and December 2023 (Rs.1.30 crore). Redemptions spiked in January 2022 (Rs.662.20 crore), when the elections to Uttar Pradesh, Uttarakhand, Punjab, Manipur and Goa assemblies were on; and again in November 2022, when the Gujarat and Himachal Pradesh assemblies went to polls.

The Congress, which got the third-highest amount among parties after the BJP and Trinamool Congress, redeemed a total of Rs. 1,421.87 crore in 3,146 bonds from April 12, 2019 to January 22, 2024. Interestingly, the party redeemed over three times as much