On 18th March, the fortress of lies around Electoral Bonds raised by The Quint’s former journalist Poonam Agarwal fell like a house of cards after she admitted to having “forgotten” about the Electoral Bond she bought in 2020. Agarwal, who was once booked for abetment of the suicide of a soldier, claimed that she purchased two Electoral Bonds in 2018. Still, the list released by the Election Commission of India had her name listed as a buyer in 2020.
Interestingly, when a video she made for The Quint revealed she bought an Electoral Bond in 2020, Agarwal conveniently blamed it on “Covid” and said she did not remember buying the bond in 2020. According to her, it was because of COVID-19 that she forgot, as “a lot was happening during that time.”
She wrote, “Clarification: I have come across a video that I recorded at The Quint in which I am showing an #ElectoralBond dated 20/10/2020. I don’t remember purchasing a bond in 2020 but only in 2018. Unique number will clear many doubts. Till then let’s not question SBI data. One can blame it on my poor memory. 2020 was COVID outbreak year, many things were happening. Maybe that’s why I don’t remember it. My apologies for my poor memory.”
While she blatantly lied about “the mismatch” in Electoral Bond data and admitted only after SBI clarified in the Supreme Court that the hidden number on bonds are only for security and not for auditing, left-liberals and a section of media houses presented her as the ‘messiah’ of truthful journalism. Notably, SBI categorically clarified that the number on the bond was just a security feature and it was not added to the records.
It is notable here that Poonam’s “realisation’ about her alleged memory loss came only after the SC hearing where SBI asserted that the codes hidden on bonds (which Poonam had used to make her claims) are for security reasons only and not for tracking details or auditing.
Propaganda website the The Wire, which has a history of making wild claims and then retracting their articles, retracted another article on Poonam’s lie, with a clarification that they are removing the article because Poonam’s claims “cannot be substantiated.”
Congress’s chairperson of Social and Digital Platforms, Supriya Shrinate, praised Agarwal for “exceptional work” while calling Electoral Bonds a “scam”. She wrote, “Kudos to Poonam Agarwal for some exceptional work on the bond scam. Her latest expose raises serious concerns on the data shared by SB. She bought the bond in April 2018, but SBI’s data showed that it was bought in October 2020. How?”
Congress has received over 1400 crores through electoral bonds, the same bonds that Congress leaders are calling a ‘scam’.
Tamil Nadu minister Dr P Thiaga Rajan quoted Agarwal and wrote, “This causes grave concern, not only about the veracity of the data submitted by SBI (as filing a false affidavit or data to the SC would be a prosecutable criminal action), but about the basic platform/systems or SBI. Don’t see how it is fit to be a bank taking public deposits.”
X user Swati Mishra, who quoted Poonam and questioned SBI over the authentication of the data, added an update. Poonam “forgot” about buying the bond but did not apologise or delete the post from X.
Journalist-turned-YouTuber Sanket Upadhyay, who runs a YouTube ‘news’ channel, The Red Mike, quoted Poonam’s so-called expose on Electoral Bonds and said, “This raises an even bigger question. Is the data even real?” However, he deleted the post after Poonam admitted to bluntly lying, claiming she had forgotten about it. However, screenshots of his post are available on social media.
Interestingly, in an interview on his channel, he tried to justify her blatant lie after Poonam admitted she “forgot” about the 2020 purchase. During a live discussion, he questioned the “date mismatch” story, to which Agarwal replied she would not say anything about it as she did not remember buying a bond in 2020. Sanket said, “Fair enough. One thing is that you mischief based on the information. On the other hand, you say I have the information but cannot say anything about it as I don’t have complete information about it. This is not mischief. This is reporting where Poonam is clearing her position.”
Sumit Awasthi of NDTV promoted her on the channel. However, till this report was published, Awasthi did not issue any clarification.
Another journalist-turned-YouTuber, Ajit Anjum, deleted his post after Agarwal admitted to “forgetting” that she bought a bond in 2020. In the now-deleted post, Anjum called it a “serious matter” and questioned SBI what exactly happened there as Agarwal claimed she did not buy a bond in 2020.
The spokesperson of the Samajwadi Party, Neha Yadav, quoted Poonam Agarwal and said, “Electoral Bond theft is a serious matter. SBI is involved in this theft.”
Congress spokesperson Lavanya Ballal Jain said, “Will SBI explain itself or hide behind legalese? Remember state bank of Mysore being merged with SBI after being an associate bank for decades?”
Journalist Akhilesh Tiwari said, “It is a serious matter. It means that the list that has come out is incorrect.”
National President of Indian Youth Congress, Srinivas BV, quoted Poonam Agarwal and said, “Modi’s guarantee. Scam in data in association with SBI.”
The propagandists, left-liberals and a section of media came out running to use the lie presented by Poonam Agarwal to target the Government of India, the Electoral Bond scheme and the State Bank of India. However, when the lie got busted, they either deleted the posts, jumped to support her or let the lies remain on social media for “eternity”. In any case, ethically they should have removed the post and apologised for supporting a lie but it did not happen.