New Delhi, August 7 (HS): Former Congress President and Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, on Thursday accused the Election Commission and the Bharatiya Janata Party of colluding to include fake voters in the voter list. He stated that the collusion between the two is weakening the country's democracy. There has been large-scale tampering with the voter list, which has led to manipulation of the election results.
During a press conference at Congress headquarters, Rahul Gandhi asserted that approximately one lakh votes were stolen in Karnataka's Bengaluru Central Lok Sabha and Mahadevpura Assembly seats, following an analysis revealing 1,00,250 suspicious voters out of a total voter list of 6.26 lakh. He identified various forms of electoral fraud: 11,965 duplicate voters, 40,009 fake addresses, 10,452 voters with abnormal address numbers, 4,132 individuals lacking valid photos, and 33,692 cases of Form 6 misuse. He emphasized the lack of support from the Election Commission during the six-month investigation, which faced continuous refusals for essential data sharing.
Gandhi pointed to possible electoral irregularities nationwide, alleging that narratives crafted around BJP victories in states like Haryana, Maharashtra, and Madhya Pradesh often distract from underlying issues. He criticized how the Election Commission schedules elections favorably for the BJP and questioned the extended voting periods using electronic voting machines, contrasting this with past practices of quick voting with paper ballots. He raised concerns over multiple voting phases in Uttar Pradesh and Maharashtra and noted Congress's repeated requests for a digital voter list, which were denied.
Furthermore, he recounted that Election Commission communications about CCTV footage being destroyed within 45 days raised suspicions about hidden irregularities. The Congress investigation in Karnataka was based on extensive documentation provided by the Election Commission, which took months to digitize. He highlighted egregious examples of Form 6 misuse, including a 70-year-old woman fraudulently registered as a first-time voter. Gandhi asserted that the Commission’s reluctance to disclose footage hinted at concealment of significant electoral fraud.
Hindusthan Samachar / Jun Sarkar
