New Delhi: Former West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee on Thursday lashed out at Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar amid a row over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, alleging that the election process in India has been “hijacked” and made “centralised” to “satisfy” the BJP-led Centre.
Addressing a press conference in Delhi, she referred to the CEC as ‘Vanish Kumar’, saying: “Someone who has tried to snatch away citizens’ voting rights, who am I to forgive him? It has to be decided by the people of India.”
Alleging voter deletions in West Bengal, she said areas won by the (undivided) Trinamool Congress saw higher deletions.
“We went to courts, even went to the EC office with a hundred ‘victims’ of the SIR…but they insulted us. Further, when our party MPs went to meet the EC regarding the party symbol, they were asked to ‘get lost’, ” she said.
The former Bengal CM also questioned the immunity provision enacted in 2023 for the Chief Election Commissioner and election commissioners.
“The immunity bill was passed when 147 MPs were suspended from the Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha. Otherwise, it would not have been supported by the majority…it is similar to a poisonous snake bite. Law cannot be taken into one’s own hands in the name of ‘so-called’ immunity,” she remarked.
Referring to ‘vote chori’ allegations by the Congress and RJD preceding the Bihar Assembly polls, Banerjee said: “It was already late by then…they tried, but details had to be studied further.”
Reading out what she said were ‘facts’, the former CM claimed: “EVM machines were burned in Bengal…the BJP masterminded the SIR.”
“From 2021 to 2026 polls, almost 3.5 lakh voters were removed from the electoral rolls,” she said.
Further, Mamata Banerjee presented constituency-wise voter details, claiming the most voter deletions from districts where the Trinamool Congress (undivided) had previously won.
She also blamed the Director General of the IT Division at the ECI, Seema Khanna, for being involved in the “abrupt deletion of voters.”
Mamata Banerjee said: “We had written a letter questioning her appointment at the Election Commission. The election process, once decentralized, has now been made completely centralized. WBCS (Executive) Officers’ Association even wrote a letter to the ECI objecting to EROs being blocked access to the ECINet software…18 BLOs even committed suicides.”
“Similar things took place in other states like Maharashtra, but no one raised questions because people trust the EC,” she said.
Claiming that she was winning with 15,000 votes from Bhabanipur constituency, she said: “Counting centres were captured after two-three rounds. I was assaulted and stopped from entering the centre. CCTVs were also blocked. EVMs were hacked.”
Banerjee asserted that she was confident that “Seema Khanna and Gyanesh Kumar hijacked the counting process in West Bengal.”
She alleged that Gyanesh Kumar’s “vendetta was only to satisfy the Central government”.
“‘Vanish Kumar’ tried to take away people’s right to vote; people of India will not forgive him,” she further said.
(IANS)
