New Delhi: Soon after the Election Commission on Monday announced holding Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in 12 states, the Congress questioned the exercise, and said the poll body’s intentions and credibility were under suspicion as neither the voters nor the opposition were satisfied with it.
In a video message posted on X, Congress’ media and publicity head Pawan Khera said: “We have not yet received answers to the questions related to the SIR conducted in Bihar. The situation was such that the Supreme Court had to step in several times to rectify the SIR in Bihar. The intentions of the Election Commission and the BJP, which has made the EC its puppet, regarding Bihar’s SIR have already come to light before the entire country. Whenever SIR happens, Election Commission employees go to every house, add new voters, and delete those who need to be deleted.”
But not even a single voter has been added in Bihar, whereas 65 lakh votes have been deleted as part of the SIR exercise, which raises several questions, Khera said.
Now they (EC) are repeating the exercise in 12 states, Khera said.
The Congress leader also said that following the revelation of ‘vote theft’ in the Aland Assembly constituency in Karnataka by Rahul Gandhi, the SIT said that a centralised operation was being carried out to strike names from the voter list.
“We will come to know about the details of this after the SIT probe is complete in Karnataka,” he said.
“Amid all this, conducting the SIR by such an Election Commission, whose credibility and intention are under suspicion, does not seem right. Clearly, neither the people, nor the opposition or the voters are satisfied,” Khera alleged in the video message.
The Congress also alleged on its X handle that various cases and methods of “vote theft” are coming to light across the country, with votes being deliberately added in some places, while in others, they are being cut.
“The Election Commission should have responded to these cases. It should have investigated them, but instead, the Election Commission got involved in the game of ‘vote theft’ itself. The SIR to be conducted in 12 states is a conspiracy against democracy. ,” the Congress said.
Meanwhile, the BJP on Monday slammed the Congress for questioning the integrity of the Election Commission over the SIR decision and called the Opposition a “herd of dissatisfied souls”, alleging that they are targeting the poll panel over voter-list revision to find an excuse for their “impending electoral losses”.
It also accused the Opposition of hypocrisy, saying the same parties that have been claiming that SIR is against the Constitution are demanding the revision exercise in some of the states.
This came after the Congress questioned the Election Commission’s move to conduct Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the Electoral rolls in 12 states and Union territories, including West Bengal, saying the poll body’s intentions and credibility are under suspicion.