New Delhi: Congress leader Rahul Gandhi has fired a fresh round of salvo against the Election Commission for allegedly being involved in systematically targeting voters and deleting or adding elector names.
But it was not his promised “hydrogen bomb”, as the Leader of the Opposition had himself pointed out, because he is still waiting for enough proof to come from his team.
At an event on the conclusion of his Voter Adhikar Yatra on September 1, Gandhi had said his party would soon come out with a “hydrogen bomb”. He was referring to revelations on alleged “vote chori (theft)”.
Till then, he pledged to continue to pull up the poll body, and yet, not seek legal recourse.
“As the Leader of Opposition (in Lok Sabha), my role in normal situations is that of the Opposition, to build up pressure on the government. My job is not to protect India’s democracy,” Gandhi said, answering a question posed by IANS.
Incidentally, like earlier instances in Parliament and outside, the Congress leader pulled out a copy of the Constitution during Thursday’s press conference. He also raised the issue of defending the democratic process in the country.
IANS wanted to know if his party would go to the courts if the poll body did not provide a direct answer.
He had earlier said that he is giving a one-week time to the Election Commission.
In Karnataka’s Aland constituency, the Gandhi scion alleged “someone” made an attempt to delete 6,018 votes ahead of the 2023 Assembly elections and that the Election Commission refused to hand over evidence sought by the state CID in the matter.
Interestingly, the Congress managed to wrest Aland from the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in 2023. The Grand Old Party candidate won by a margin of over 10,000 votes, and cornered some 51 per cent of the votes polled.
In contrast, it lost to the BJP in the 2018 Assembly election by less than 700 votes and had managed about 47 per cent of the mandate.
The claimed deletion, if any, seems to have gone in favour of the Congress nominee.
In Maharashtra’s Rajura constituency, the Congress leader claimed “someone” had added 6,850 voters to the electoral rolls.
In this constituency, the BJP gained the seat from Congress in the 2024 Assembly election with about a 3,000-vote margin, while in 2019, Congress had won by about 2,500 votes. This was when voter turnout had increased by over 6 per cent over that of 2019 (with respect to total voters in the constituency, respectively).
Meanwhile, while Gandhi wanted “institutions” to take suo motu initiative for a probe and subsequent action, he referred to the Karnataka CID having initiated an inquiry over the alleged voter deletion in Aland.
Meanwhile, the Election Commission has issued a rebuttal. Dismissing his claims as incorrect and baseless, it said that deletion can not be done online by any member of the public. Also, the affected person gets an opportunity to place his point.
In 2023, there were attempts at the deletion of electors in the Aland Assembly Constituency, but it was unsuccessful, and an FIR was filed by the poll body itself.
Last month, Rahul raised questions on the electoral outcome of the Bangalore Central Lok Sabha seat. In a similar claim, he alleged “stealing” of one lakh votes in the Mahadevapura Assembly constituency during the 2024 polls.
(IANS)
