Rs 1,368 crore - that's the total amount lottery baron Santiago Martin's firm Future Gaming and Hotel Services Private Ltd gave to political parties via electoral bonds. Based on the data released by the State Bank of India on the Election Commission of India website, Martin's firm is the highest purchaser of electoral bonds in the country, more than any other company or individual.
Now, which party was the biggest beneficiary of Future Gaming's donations?
There's no way of ascertaining that as the alphanumeric code of each electoral bond hasn't been made public as yet.
But there is another interesting aspect to the electoral bonds purchased by Future Gaming and that is the timing of the purchases. Or to use a more popular word, the chronology.
It turns out that several of the firm's biggest donations came within a few days after the assets of promoter Santiago Martin were attached by the Enforcement Directorate.
Future Gaming Bought Electoral Bonds a Few Days After ED Action
Now, Future Gaming isn't the only firm among the top donors that has faced raids from agencies. A deep-dive by The Quint shows that 14 out of the top 30 Electoral Bond-buyers faced raids. Future Gaming is only one of them.
What's interesting in Future Gaming's case is how a big chunk of its donations happened soon after ED raids.
These are the electoral bond purchases that fit into this pattern. We have collated these dates based on the press releases issued by the ED.
December 2021-January 2022
23 December, 2021: ED provisionally attached immovable assets worth Rs. 19.59 Crore of Santiago Martin and others under PMLA in the Sikkim Lottery Scam Case. With this, the total attachment in this case reached Rs. 277.59 Crore.
5 January, 2022: Future Gaming purchases electoral bonds worth Rs 100 crore.
6 January, 2022: Future Gaming purchases electoral bonds worth Rs 110 crore.
April 2022
2 April, 2022: ED provisionally attached movable assets worth Rs.409.92 crore under PMLA, 2002 in the case of Lottery scam against M/s. Future Gaming & Hotel Services Pvt. Ltd. and its various sub-distributors/area-distributors.
7 April, 2022: Future Gaming purchases electoral bonds worth Rs 100 crore.
July 2022
2 July, 2022: ED provisionally attached movable and immovable properties worth Rs. 173.48 crore under PMLA in the case against S Martin & Others.
6 July, 2022: Future Gaming purchases electoral bonds worth Rs 75 crore.
September-October 2023
21 September, 2023: ED filed Prosecution Complaint Future Gaming and 15 other companies, under PMLA. Total attachment in this case stands at Rs. 411 Crore as of this date.
5 October, 2023: Future Gaming purchases electoral bonds worth Rs 65 crore.
The four sets of purchases that were made barely days after ED action, amount to Rs 450 crore or about one third of the total donations of Future Gaming via Electoral Bonds.
If we expand the time period and look at donations made by Future Gaming within six months of some action or the other by the ED, the total comes to Rs 696 crore. This is about 50 percent of the total donations via electoral bonds for Future Gaming.
Unanswered Questions
Why did so many - one-third - of Future Gaming's Electoral Bond purchases take place barely days after they faced action from the ED?
Out of these bonds worth Rs 385 crore were purchased soon after assets linked to Martin were attached by the ED. What explains this?
The Net Profits of Future Gaming in the financial years 2019 to 2023 were Rs 215 crore. The amount it spent on electoral bonds in this period was Rs 1368 crore, over six times as much. How does one explain this? What does the company gain from electoral bonds?
This was also a time when the ED was attaching assets linked to Future Gaming and its promoters running into hundreds of crores. In such a scenario, how could they afford to spend so much on electoral bonds? And to what end?
Which parties were the biggest beneficiaries of the donations by Future Gaming? Was it more to the BJP, that is ruling at the Centre or to regional parties ruling states where the film has major commercial interests?
We are not alleging any causation between the ED action and the purchase of electoral bonds by Future Gaming. We must state here that in addition to ED, firms linked to Santiago are being probed by multiple central agencies as well as state police forces. But the timing of these purchases by the lottery company and the complete imbalance between their net profits and their bond purchases does raise questions.
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)