The complaint, lodged by Adarsh R Iyer, Co-President of ‘Janaadhikaara Sangharsha Parishath’ (JSP), also names Karnataka BJP chief and B S Yediyurappa’s son B Y Vijayendra and party leader Nalinkumar Kateel among others.

The complainant has alleged that the accused “committed extortion under the guise and garb of electoral bonds and benefitted to the tune of 8,000 and more crore of rupees,” news agency PTI reported.

He further alleged that Sitharaman, through the clandestine aid and support of ED officials, facilitated extortion of thousands of crores of rupees for the benefit of others both at the state and national levels.

“The entire extortion racket under the garb of electoral bonds has been orchestrated hand in glove with officials of BJP at various levels,” the complaint stated.

Barely weeks before the Lok Sabha elections, the Supreme Court, in February, had struck down the Narendra Modi government’s 2018 electoral bonds scheme of anonymous political funding, terming it as “unconstitutional, arbitrary and violative of Article 14”.

Highlighting that “the information about funding to a political party is essential for a voter to exercise their freedom to vote in an effective manner”, a five-judge Constitution bench, headed by Chief Justice of India D Y Chandrachud, said that changes made in the laws to implement the scheme were unconstitutional.

Holding the scheme “violative” of the constitutional right to freedom of speech and expression and right to information, the court did not agree with the Centre’s contention that it was meant to bring about transparency and curb black money in political funding.