The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Thursday sharply rebutted Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s allegation of massive deletion of votes in Karnataka’s Aland, calling it incorrect and baseless. The poll body asserted that no deletion of votes can happen without giving an opportunity of being heard to the affected person.
Stepping up his offensive against the ECI, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday alleged mass deletion of voters from Congress strongholds in Karnataka during the 2023 Assembly election. These voter IDs, he alleged, were deleted using fake logins and phone numbers from outside the State. He also alleged that voter deletion was being executed not by individuals, but with the use of software and in a centralised manner.
Gandhi said the poll panel must stop protecting “vote chors” and provide, within a week, the information sought by the Karnataka CID in an investigation into voter deletions. If not, the ECI will be complicit in the “murder of the Constitution”, he alleged at a press conference at the Congress headquarters in the Capital.
Reacting to the ECI’s response, the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha accused the ECI of blocking the Karnataka CID’s investigation into alleged voter deletions by refusing to release data for 18 months and claimed that this is clear proof that the poll body is protecting “<vote chors></i>”.
He wrote on X, “After our Aland candidate exposed the fraud, the local EC official filed an FIR, but the CID investigation has been BLOCKED by CEC. The Karnataka CID has written 18 letters in 18 months, requesting all incriminating evidence, which has been blocked by the CEC. The Karnataka EC has sent multiple requests to ECI to comply with the investigation — BLOCKED by CEC. Details of destination IP, device ports, and OTP trails have been withheld — BLOCKED by CEC. If this vote theft was not caught and the 6,018 votes were deleted, the Congress candidate could have lost the election, he argued. “CEC Gyanesh Kumar — stop giving excuses. Release the evidence to the Karnataka CID. NOW.”
Responding to Rahul, the Chief Election Officer (CEO) of Karnataka, in a press note, asserted that all the incorrect applications were rejected, and an FIR was filed in the matter in 2023. It further claimed the ERO in Aland received 6,018 Form 7 applications during December 2022, which were submitted online using various apps such as NVSP, VHA, and GARUDA. Suspecting the genuineness of such a large number of applications submitted online for the deletion of electors’ names in the Aland Assembly constituency, each application was verified.
“Only 24 applications were found to be genuine, and another 5,994 were found to be incorrect. Accordingly, 24 applications were accepted and 5,994 incorrect applications were rejected and not deleted,” the statement read. The Karnataka CEO further said that the ERO lodged an FIR with the Inspector of Police, Aland Police Station in Kalaburagi district, based on the inquiry findings in February 2023. Based on the instructions given by ECI, the CEO, Karnataka, has handed over to the Superintendent of Police, Kalaburagi district, on 06.09.2023, all the available information with ECI for completing the investigation,” the statement added.
Several BJP leaders, including Amit Shah, spoke out to slam Rahul, with Anurag Thakur saying he was trying to stoke chaos and create in India the kind of unrest seen in Nepal and Bangladesh. Addressing a poll rally in Bihar, Union Home Minister Shah said Gandhi’s accusation of vote theft is a “false narrative”. “They (opposition parties) had taken recourse to similar tactics earlier when they had alleged that we were out to scrap reservations for SCs, STs and OBCs.”
Reacting to Rahul’s allegations, the BJP leader and former Union Minister Anurag Thakur claimed that Rahul‘s repeated allegations against constitutional institutions showed his and the Congress’s lack of faith in Indian democracy, noting that the Election Commission has rejected his latest “vote chori” charge as baseless and incorrect. Thakur said “infiltrators first politics” seems to be the sole agenda of Gandhi and asserted that the interests of SCs, STs and OBCs will be harmed the most if the Congress’s alleged agenda of protecting illegal voters is allowed.
Defending the Election Commission after Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar was repeatedly criticised by Gandhi at his press conference, Thakur cited the association of past CECs like M S Gill, who became a minister in the UPA government, and T N Seshan, who fought Lok Sabha polls on a Congress ticket, to hit back. He dared the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha to go to court if his arguments have strength.
Addressing a press conference, the Congress leader also alleged that constitutional institutions are not doing their job properly and said the institutions within the country, including the legal framework, should step in.
Rahul also made it clear at the outset that the revelations were not the “hydrogen bomb” that he had promised and he will soon reveal those details.
“I am going to make a serious claim about Gyanesh Kumar. I am not saying this lightly; I am the leader of the opposition. The CEC is protecting ‘vote chors’ and the people who have destroyed Indian democracy,” Rahul alleged. “I am just creating the foundation. This has been going on for 10-15 years. India’s democracy has been hijacked. Democracy can only be saved by the people of India. Rahul Gandhi can show the truth. The day the people realise that their democracy and Constitution have been stolen, the job will be done,” he said.
The Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha cited details of alleged attempts to delete 6,018 votes in Karnataka’s Aland constituency in the run-up to 2023 assembly polls. He also gave the example of Maharashtra’s Rajura constituency, where he claimed 6,850 voters were added in a “fraudulent” manner using automated software.
“The same system is doing this. It is doing it in Karnataka, Maharashtra, it has done it in Haryana, Uttar Pradesh, Bihar and we have proof of it,” the Congress leader alleged. “Our demand is Gyanesh Kumar, do your job, you have taken an oath, you are India’s chief election commissioner, you must give evidence to the Karnataka CID,” Gandhi said, asking the EC to provide the details within a week.
Talking about the Aland example, Gandhi said there were targeted deletions in strong Congress booths. “The top 10 booths with maximum deletions were Congress strongholds. Congress won eight out of the 10 booths in 2018. This was not a coincidence; this was a planned operation,” he alleged.
He said his revelations today are another milestone in demonstrating to the youth of the country how elections in the country are being “rigged”. Someone has been systematically targeting millions of voters for deletion across India, Rahul claimed, adding that some group of people have been systematically targeting millions of voters, especially minorities and Dalits, for deletion.
“I am the leader of the opposition and I will not say anything which is not backed by 100 per cent proof...I am someone who loves my country, I love my Constitution, I love the democratic process and I am protecting that process,” He said in the Aland segment, someone tried to delete 6,018 votes and got caught “by coincidence”, alleging that names of Congress voters were being deleted systematically.
“The booth-level officer noticed that her uncle’s vote got deleted and found her neighbour had deleted her uncle. She asked her neighbour who said he had no idea. It was found that some other force hijacked the process and deleted the vote, and as luck would have it got caught,” Rahul said.
He claimed that 6,018 applications were filed impersonating voters and this filing was done automatically using mobile numbers from outside Karnataka.
The Congress leader also called on stage a voter whose vote was sought to be deleted and the person whose name was used to get the deletion done, with both denying any knowledge of it. According to the Congress leader, the deletions were being done using software and not through individuals, as the process of filling the form was done within seconds and was done in the wee hours of the day.
Noting that there is an ongoing investigation in Karnataka, Rahul said the CID has sent 18 letters in 18 months to the Election Commission and asked for some simple facts, such as the destination IP from where these applications were filled and OTP trails. They are not giving it because it will lead us to where this operation is being conducted, the Congress leader claimed, while accusing Gyanesh Kumar of protecting those who are indulging in such acts.
“EC knows who is doing this. I want every youngster in India to know this. They are doing this to your future. When they are not giving this information, they are defending the murderers of democracy,” he said. The Congress leader said it will take two to three months for the research and presentations on the alleged “vote chori” that his party has been carrying out.
Asked who the mastermind is, the Congress leader said he will also lay that before the people and his “hydrogen bomb” of revelations will put everything out in black and white.