‘BJP arbitrarily deleting names from voter list’
New Delhi: Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, on Tuesday alleged that during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar, the BJP is arbitrarily deleting names from the voter list, particularly those of individuals unlikely to vote for the ruling party.
“It’s no longer about adding voters in bulk; it’s now about subtracting them selectively,” he said.
The Congress leader reiterated his allegation that elections in India are being “stolen,” asserting that the manipulation of voter rolls has become a political strategy under the present dispensation.
“This is not an assumption; this is a reality,” Gandhi said, as he laid out what he termed as a “detailed and documented” case of voter manipulation during the recent Lok Sabha elections. He disclosed that the Congress party conducted a six-month investigation in one Karnataka constituency, unearthing, according to him, “how the BJP is stealing elections.” While he did not name the specific seat, Gandhi claimed the study revealed systemic additions and deletions in the electoral rolls that were “neither accidental nor coincidental.”
Criticising the Election Commission, Gandhi said that requests for machine-readable digital copies of electoral rolls had been denied to his party. “When we asked for the video recording of the counting process, the Commission changed the rules,” he added, accusing the constitutional body of abdicating its impartial role.
He further alleged that in Maharashtra, nearly one crore names were added to the electoral rolls between the Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha elections, an irregularity that, according to Gandhi, tilted the electoral outcome. “The numbers speak for themselves, and so do the timelines,” he remarked.
Gandhi’s remarks have rekindled a long-standing concern among sections of the Opposition over the transparency and credibility of India’s electoral processes. The INDIA alliance has sought a debate in Parliament on electoral reforms, data transparency in voter rolls, and the accountability of the Election Commission.
