Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar on Sunday strongly rebuked senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his ‘vote chori’ (vote theft) allegations. He asked Mr Gandhi to either sign an affidavit or apologise to the nation for his remarks, calling them “an insult to the Constitution of India.”
The comments came on the day Mr Gandhi launched his 1,300 km-long ‘Voter Adhikar Yatra’ from Sasaram in poll-bound Bihar, intensifying the Opposition INDIA bloc’s campaign against what he called vote theft.
Gandhi’s Allegations and ECI’s Response
On 7 August, Rahul Gandhi had alleged the “vote chori” of 1,00,250 votes in a Karnataka Lok Sabha constituency. He claimed 11,965 duplicate voters, 40,009 voters with fake or invalid addresses, 10,452 bulk voters at a single address, and 4,132 voters with invalid photos.
Reacting to these claims, Gyanesh Kumar said, “And amid all this in the presence of the media, if you say that there are duplicate voters and some people have voted twice and call my voters criminals, it is not possible that the Election Commission will not react. You will have to sign an affidavit or apologise to the nation (desh se maafi maangni padegi). There is no third option. I want to say that if there is no affidavit in seven days, it means the allegations are baseless.”
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He added, “When more than 7 crore votes of Bihar are standing with the Election Commission of India, neither can any question mark be raised on the credibility of the Election Commission nor the credibility of the voters. When the voter doesn’t challenge his candidate selection in the courts and then wrong words like ‘vote chori’ are used to mislead the people, isn’t it an insult to the Constitution of India?”
On Duplicate EPIC Cards
Kumar explained that duplicate voter ID cards (EPICs) can occur in two ways. First, a person in one state may have the same EPIC number as a different person in another state. About three lakh such cases were identified and corrected nationwide. Second, a single person may appear on the voter list at multiple locations with different EPIC numbers.
Responding to demands for CCTV footage of voters, the CEC said, “We saw a few days ago that photos of many voters were presented to the media without their permission. Allegations were made against them, and they were used. Should the Election Commission share the CCTV videos of any voter, including their mothers, daughters-in-law, or daughters? Only those whose names are on the voter list cast their votes to elect their candidate.”
Special Intensive Revision in Bihar
Gyanesh Kumar highlighted the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in Bihar. “Step by step, all the stakeholders are committed, trying, and working hard to make the SIR of Bihar a complete success. The SIR exercise has not been done in the last 20 years, though it has been carried out more than 10 times in the country. The main purpose of SIR is to purify the voter list. It is being carried out after receiving many complaints from political parties.”
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He added that about 1.6 lakh Booth Level Agents (BLA) have prepared a draft SIR list in poll-bound Bihar. “As this draft list was being prepared in every booth, the Booth Level Agents of all political parties verified it with their signatures. Voters have submitted a total of 28,370 claims and objections.”
West Bengal SIR Update
Regarding West Bengal, the CEC said, “The three Election Commissioners will decide when the exercise of SIR will be carried out in West Bengal or other states.”
Addressing allegations of double voting, Kumar said, “Some voters alleged double voting. When asked for proof, no answer was given. Neither the Election Commission nor any voter is afraid of such false allegations. When politics is being done by targeting the voters of India by keeping a gun on the shoulder of the Election Commission, today the Election Commission wants to make it clear to everyone that the Election Commission fearlessly stood like a rock with all the voters of all sections and all religions including the poor, rich, elderly, women, youth without any discrimination, is standing and will continue to stand.”
Machine-Readable Voter List Prohibited
The CEC clarified that machine-readable voter lists are prohibited following a 2019 Supreme Court judgment. “We have to understand the difference between a machine-readable voter list and a searchable voter list. You can search the voter list available on the Election Commission website by entering the EPIC number. You can also download it. This, he said, is not called machine-readable.”
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Kumar emphasized that only Indian citizens can vote. “People from other countries do not have the right. If such people have filled out the enumeration form, then during the SIR process, they will have to prove their nationality by submitting some documents. Their names will be removed after the investigation.”
Commenting on the upcoming Lok Sabha elections, Kumar said, “More than one crore employees, more than 10 lakh booth-level agents, more than 20 lakh polling agents of candidates work for the elections. In such a transparent process in front of so many people, can any voter steal votes?”
Equal Treatment for All Political Parties
The CEC reiterated the impartiality of the Election Commission. “As per the Constitution of India, every citizen of India who has attained the age of 18 years must become a voter and must also vote. You all know that, as per the law, every political party is born through registration with the Election Commission. Then how can the Election Commission discriminate among the same political parties? For the Election Commission, all are equal. No matter who belongs to any political party, the Election Commission will not step back from its constitutional duty,” Kumar said.
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