Congress leader Rahul Gandhi and Maharashtra Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis on Tuesday traded jibes over the eight per cent increase in the number of voters between the 2024 Lok Sabha and Assembly polls, with the leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha alleging “vote theft” by the BJP in CM’s constituency and Fadnavis using popular “Jhoot Bole Kauwa Kaate” song to accuse Rahul of “lying”.
Flagging the issue of eight per cent increase in the number of Fadnavis’ home constituency in Nagpur, the leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha alleged that “these were not isolated voter glitches” but “this is a vote theft” and demanded immediate release of machine-readable digital voter rolls and the CCTV footage.
Retaliating swiftly, Fadnavis invoked popular song from film “Bobby” (1973) “Jhuth Bole Kauwa Kaate, Kaale Kauwe Se Dariyo” to accuse Rahul of “lying” and saying: “the pain of crushing defeat in Maharashtra is growing daily.
But how long will you keep shooting arrows in the air?” Taking to “X”, Rahul alleged: “In Maharashtra CM’s own constituency, the voter list grew by eight per cent in just fivemonths. Some booths saw a 20-50 per cent surge. BLOs reported unknown individuals casting votes. Media uncovered thousands of voters with no verified address”.
Wondering if the Election Commission of India (ECI) was either “silent” or “complicit”, Rahul wrote: “And the EC? Silent — or complicit. These aren’t isolated glitches. This is vote theft. The cover-up is the confession. That’s why we demand the immediate release of machine-readable digital voter rolls and CCTV footage”.
In hitting back at the Congress leader, Fadnavis wrote: “By the way, for your information, there are more than 25 constituencies in Maharashtra where voter turnout increased by over 8 per cent between the Lok Sabha and Assembly elections and Congress won in many of those places”.
“In the West Nagpur constituency, adjacent to my South-West region, voter turnout increased by seven per cent (27,065) and Congress candidate Vikas Thakre won the election,” the chief minister said.
“In North Nagpur, voter turnout increased by 7 per cent (29,348) and Nitin Raut from Congress won,” Fadnavis said.
“In Pune district’s Wadgaon Sheri, voter turnout increased by 10 per cent (50,911) and Bapusaheb Pathare from the Sharad Pawar faction won. In Malad West, voter turnout increased by 11 per cent (38,625) and your Congress party’s Aslam Shaikh won,” Fadnavis said.
“In Mumbra, voter turnout increased by nine per cent (46,041), and Jitendra Awhad from the Sharad Pawar faction won,” the Chief Minister said.
“Even if not with allied parties, it would have been better if you had spoken to your own party’s long-
time associates like Aslam Shaikh, Vikas Thakre and Nitin Raut before this tweet. At least the Congress wouldn’t have performed so poorly due to a lack of communication,” Fadnavis added.
Maharashtra Congress President Harshawardhan Sapkal supported the stand taken by Rahul on the issue and asked chief minister Fadnavis to take “moral responsibility” and resign from his post Congress’ chief spokesperson Atul Londhe hit out at the the Public Information Officer for not providing information pertaining to voter registration under a RTI query. Rahul’s post on “X” came in the wake of the ECI writing to him on his sensational allegation that the “large-scale rigging” in voter turn-out in the 2024 Maharashtra Assembly elections, saying that all polls held by the poll panel were strictly as per laws passed by Parliament and rules and the entire exercise involves thousands of personnel, including booth-level agents appointed by political parties.
It may be recalled that in an article written in a few leading national newspapers on June 7, Rahul had alleged “large-scale rigging” in voter turn-out in the 2024 Assembly and written: “If some earlier
election outcomes seemed odd, the outcome of the 2024 Maharashtra Vidhan Sabha elections is glaringly strange. The scale of rigging was so desperate that, despite all efforts to conceal it, telling evidence has emerged from the official statistics, without reliance on any non-official source, revealing a step-by-step playbook”.
Rahul Gandhi’s article dwelt upon the statistics of the voter turnout statistics of the four Maharashtra Assembly elections — 2009, 2014, 2019 and 2024, mentions that in the 2024 Assembly polls the provisional electoral turn-out had risen by a staggering 7.83 per cent from 58.22 to 66.05.
“Voter rolls and CCTV footage are tools to be used to strengthen democracy and not ornaments to be locked up while democracy is violated. The people of India have a right to be assured that no records have been or will be trashed,” Rahul wrote. “It is not hard to guess why rigging in Maharashtra in November 2024 took on such desperate proportions. But, rigging is like match-fixing—the fixing side might win the game, but irreparable damage is done to institutions and to people’s faith in the result, match-fixed elections are a poison to any democracy,” Rahul had said.