New Delhi: ‘Lottery king’ Santiago Martin’s company, Future Gaming and Hotel Services Pvt. Ltd., was the single largest donor of funds to the ruling Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) in Tamil Nadu through electoral bonds between 2022 and 2023, fresh data uploaded by the Election Commission of India (ECI) have revealed. Adhering to the Supreme Court’s directive, the commission on Sunday (March 17) uploaded on its website the submissions made by the political parties in 2023 on electoral bonds that they had received through State Bank of India (SBI). Those submissions were handed over to the the top court by the commission in sealed covers in November 2023 to maintain the confidentiality clause of the electoral bonds scheme brought by the Narendra Modi government in 2018. The details furnished by the parties were from April 2019 to November 2023. As per the DMK treasurer and party MP T.R. Baalu’s submission to the ECI on November 11, 2023, the SBI, which had issued bonds to the buyers, didn’t “require the details of the donor to be furnished to the donee”. “Under the circumstances, the donors did not strictly adhere to the requirement of furnishing their details whenever they handed over the electoral bond to us,” Baluu had stated in the letter, adding, that the party was, however, able to “collect the details from them” on time to respond to the ECI’s call. The details in the submission showed that Santiago Martin’s Future Gaming and Hotel Services Pvt. Ltd. had donated Rs 60 crores to the DMK through electoral bonds between October 23-29, 2020 and a staggering Rs 249 crore between April 5, 2021 and January 1, 2022. The DMK government, with M.K. Stalin as the chief minister, was formed after the April 2021 assembly elections.In the 2021-2022 financial year, the Coimbatore-based company had picked electoral bonds to fund the ruling DMK for Rs 309 crores. In 2022, the company pumped in more funds with a sum of Rs 185 crores donated to the party through electoral bonds. In 2023, the company once again donated Rs 40 crores to the party. As per DMK’s submissions, between 2020 and 2023, it donated a total of Rs 534 crores to the DMK through electoral bonds.Perusing the SBI’s data on electoral bonds till January 2024, the Future Gaming group, having spent a cumulative sum of Rs 1,368 crores, came across as the single largest donor to political parties through the scheme. Yet another company, Mega Infrastructure Developers Private Limited, registered in New Delhi’s Panchsheel Enclave, donated a total of Rs 105 crores between April 2019 and 2022 to the DMK. Another company, identified as only Triveni, had contributed to the DMK’s coffers Rs 8 crores between 2019 and 2022. A clasp of other companies, seemingly dealing with cement manufacturing, also donated a cumulative sum of Rs 19 crores to DMK through bonds. The Sun TV Network of Kalanidhi Maran also featured in the list of donors, having made a one-time payment of Rs 10 crores in 2021-22. The total amount the party stated to have received through electoral bonds between April 2019 and November 2023 stood at Rs. 706 crores. AIADMKAccording to the freshly released data, Chennai Super Kings Cricket Limited donated Rs 5 crores to Tamil Nadu’s All India Anna Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (AIADMK) party in 2019. The bonds purchased by India Cement Limited-owned CSK on April 3, 2019 were encashed on the 12th of the same month. Two bonds purchased were of denomination R. 1 crore each and the rest were of Rs 10 lakhs each. The data also shows that India Cement donated as additional Rs 10 crores to the ruling MK Stalin-led DMK.Narayanaswami Srinivasan, the owner of ICL has also been the Chairman of the International Cricket Council and former President of the Board of Control for Cricket in India (BCCI). In September last year, Srinivasan and his family became the promoters of Chennai Super Kings Cricket Ltd. (CSK), the designated owner of the Chennai team in the Indian Premier League. India Cements’ annual report shows that Srinivasan and his family own 28.14% of CSK.In January this year, the Enforcement Directorate carried out raids at the office of India Cements Capital Limited, an associate company of ICL, for alleged violations of the Foreign Exchange Management Act (FEMA).The company, however, had termed the search as “normal”. In a statement issued soon after the raid, ICL claimed: “ICCL is an authorised dealer in providing forex services and has been providing these services to its clients complying with rules framed by Reserve Bank of India. ICCL, being one of the associates of The India Cements Limited, ED officials raised certain queries with us and we have provided necessary clarifications to them.”