Electoral Bonds Scrapped, but BJP’s Funding Remains Strong Through Trusts

New Delhi: The Supreme Court had canceled the electoral bond scheme in February 2024, holding it unconstitutional. That decision was aimed at promoting a transparent way of giving political donations, but new figures show that it did not lead to a decline in donations to the ruling BJP. Instead, huge sums of money have flowed into the BJP's account through electoral trusts. 

What changed after the abolition of electoral bonds?

The BJP has received donations of over 3,577 Rs crore from electoral trusts alone during 2024-25. Trusts thus played a large role in party funding, even though electoral bonds no longer exist. For this reason, it is being said that despite the cancellation of the bond scheme, there was no negative impact on BJP's funding.

Why did BJP get a bigger share?

The system of electoral trust already exists in democracies and is a legitimate source of donations to political parties. After the bonds expired, big companies and donors adopted this trust route. According to reports, BJP got about 83.6 percent of the total money received through the trust. Congress got about 7.3 percent and Trinamool Congress 3.6 percent from this source. 
The Times of India

The biggest contribution comes from the Prudent Electoral Trust, which gave a total of more than Rs 2,668 crore to various parties, of which the BJP received about Rs 2,180 crore. Apart from this, other trusts like the Progressive Electoral Trust, AB General Trust, and New Democratic Trust also gave huge amounts, most of which went to BJP's account.

Did Congress or other parties also benefit?

An interesting thing is that the amount of donations received by other opposition parties, including Congress, through the trust route was much less than that of BJP. The amount Congress received from trusts was much less than that of BJP, and this clearly shows that the trust model is still proving to be the strongest funding channel for BJP. 

Analysts say that despite the abolition of electoral bonds, corporate donors and big institutions still want to continue political funding. The solution to this is through the electoral trust route, which makes the identification of donations somewhat transparent. 

How the new funding method is working

Overall, the abolition of electoral bonds has not caused any major blow to the BJP's resources. The path of funding has changed, but the flow of money still continues, and that too on a large scale. This is the reason why this issue remains at the center of political debate.