Meet Poonam Agarwal, The Journalist Who Exposed Unique Hidden Numbers On Electoral Bonds (Image: X/@poonamjourno)

On March 15, the Supreme Court of India sought a reply from the State Bank of India (SBI) for not sharing the unique code provided on the now-banned electoral bonds. The apex court has issued a notice to SBI on this matter. In April 2018, an investigation by The Quint exposed that electoral bonds have unique hidden alphanumeric numbers.

Notably, Poonam Agarwal, who was working as a journalist with The Quint, bought an electoral bond to reveal that electoral bonds have unique hidden alphanumeric numbers printed on them. During a conversation with The Wire, Poonam Agarwal said that she purchased the electoral bond from the SBI Parliament Branch, which is the only branch in Delhi that sells electoral bonds. Poonam Agarwal said that the SBI officer at the branch checked why she was interested in purchasing the bond. She told the officer that she was interested in donating to political parties through the bond.

Poonam Agarwal said that the officers were a little suspicious about her as to why an individual had to purchase the electoral bond. She also gave her KYC details and a cheque of Rs 1,000 before getting the bond. Following the purchase, a forensic test of the bond was done by Poonam Agarwal. The test was conducted at the Truth Lab forensic lab, and the lab report revealed the presence of unique alphanumeric numbers on the Rs 1,000 electoral bond. Notably, the hidden unique number is visible only under UV rays.

The investigative journalist purchased one more bond worth Rs 1,000 to prove that there is a hidden unique number. A forensic test was done for the second bond too, and it was a different hidden number. Poonam Agarwal thus proved that electoral bonds have hidden unique numbers.

At the same time, SBI said in an RTI reply that the unique numbers in the bonds were recorded and are used for audit trail. Poonam Agarwal told The Wire that the finance ministry also responded to her story and said that the hidden number is a security feature. The ministry of finance mentioned in a press release in 2018 that the “random serial numbers” present on the electoral bond are not linked to any party transaction or cannot be used for tracking the transactions.

According to SBI, a total of 22,217 electoral bonds were purchased and 22,030 redeemed by various political parties between April 1, 2019 and February 15, 2024.