NEW DELHI : In eight states of the Hindi heartland, which elect about 200 Lok Sabha members, the fund flow to regional parties through the now-scrapped electoral bond scheme was poor in comparison to their southern counterparts and the BJP, according to data disclosed by the Election Commission and the parties.The eight states are Uttar Pradesh, Bihar, Utatrakhand, Madhya Pradesh, Rajasthan, Jharkhand, Chhattisgarh and Haryana.The BJP, which is the ruling party in six of the 8 states and in power though an alliance in one, got Rs 6986.5 crore through electoral bonds between March 2018 and July 2023. But none of the major regional parties in these states could manage to find a place in the list of big gainers, barring Lalu Prasad Yadav-led RJD, Nitish Kumar-led JD(U) and Akhilesh Yadav-led SP.UP has 80 Lok Sabha seats, Bihar 40, MP 29, Rajasthan 25, Jharkhand 14, Chhattisgarh 11, Haryana 10 and Uttarakhand 5. In the politically crucial UP, only one out of the five major regional parties received contributions through the electoral bonds, which was introduced by the Centre in 2017. The parties which did not receive funds include the BSP, the Azad Samaj Party (Kanshi Ram) ASP, Suheldev Bhartiya Samaj Party (SBSP) and the RLD.Making the disclosure on behalf of the party, SP secretary general Ram Gopal Yadav submitted to the EC that the party received electoral bonds worth Rs 84 lakh in April 2019 and another Rs 3 crore on January 10, 2022, ahead of the UP assembly polls. The party also submitted that in May 2019, ahead of the general election, it received electoral bonds worth Rs 10 crore via “unnamed” sources “by post”.
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