As if the ‘Special Intensive Revision’ in Bihar months ahead of polls hadn’t raised enough doubts on ‘free and fair’ elections, the leader of opposition in Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, came up with another bombshell allegations of what he termed “vote chori”, accusing the Election Commission and ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of being complicit in ‘rigging’ of 2024 Lok Sabha elections. In this Blog, I will try to detail Rahul Gandhi’s charge and the political upheaval it could create in the Indian politics.

Rahul’s “atom bomb” presser

On August 7, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, came up with a huge presentation, during which he alleged massive discrepancies in the voter list of the Mahadevpura assembly segment of the Bangalore Central constituency during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, alleging that around 1,00,250 fake voters were present. In his hour-long presentation, Rahul detailed five different ways through which, according to him, the “vote theft” is taking place.

Firstly, he points to ‘duplicate’ voters, ie, the same person appearing on the voter list multiple booths both in and out of the state. Secondly, he pointed towards alleged fake or invalid addresses, under which he showed a plethora of voters who were registered with ‘House No. 0’. Thirdly, he showed a bulk of voters who were registered on one address. A particular single-room house made quite headlines, where 80 voters are registered, a claim which was found correct by multiple ground reports later. Fourthly, he pointed to ‘invalid’ photos, where either the photo is missing, or is unrecognizable. And finally, Rahul alleged a “blatant misuse” of Form-6 (used by first-time voters), pointing to many cases where aged people are in record of using it.

One particularly noteworthy thing in Rahul’s allegations was these were not just allegations, but serious charge, which the Leader of Opposition put up with solid proof comprising of ECI’s own data. So, it was very absurd, when EC simply tried to brush off the charge as “misleading”. It’s their own bloody data, and being India’s poll body, it can’t deny taking accountability from its own voter rolls. Also, Rahul and Congress have often been accused of using EC as ‘scapegoat’ after losing elections and then running away. The allegations are somewhat true. But, this time, Rahul and his team, actually did a meticulous job, working hard for 6 months by searching through the 6-feet pile of physical voter rolls, and presenting actual facts instead of just wild claims.

Now, irrespective of which side of the spectrum you stand, these are indeed extremely serious allegations questioning the very neutrality of elections, based on which, we even call ourselves a democracy. If actually, this level of malpractices and discrepancies are present, then it’s not just “chori” but indeed a “loot” (this line is borrowed from the Great Ravish Kumar). The way mainstream media (Godi Media) has tried to downplay this issue is both problematic and shameful.

The ‘Problematic’ Response from ECI

Just hours after Rahul’s presser, the Election Commission labelled his allegations as ‘misleading’ without providing any proper explanation or proof. Just hours later, the BJP held a press conference attacking Rahul and Congress party for levelling charges against EC. They accused Congress for crying foul only when results don’t go their way. It was indeed a bit surprising, as Rahul’s allegations were mainly directed at EC (though he also alleged collusion with BJP), so there was no reason for BJP to come and defend the highest poll body of the country.

Following this, some information and rebuttal kept coming from here and there via ‘sources’, but the EC kept hiding behind a shell and instead demanded Rahul to sign an “oath on paper” for his allegations. Now, this is very complex, as making charges on oath means that if you’re proven wrong you might be banned from contesting. Now, instead of taking accountability as the poll body and looking into such serious charges, the EC is trying to trick the LoP into a complex legal muddle.

Day later came another press conference from the BJP where it alleged that “lakhs” of discrepancies were also present in Rae Bareli (Rahul Gandhi’s seat), Kannauj (Akhilesh Yadav), Kolathur (MK Stalin), Mainpuri (Dimple Yadav), Diamond Harbour (Abhishek Banerjee) and Wayanad (Priyanka Gandhi). Now, I don’t know what BJP’s Anurag Thakur was thinking, but he actually ended up proving Rahul’s allegations of “massive discrepancies” in voter list accurate. Interestingly, the EC didn’t even present any objection or response on BJP’s allegations.

Finally, on August 17, 10 days after Rahul’s presser (and just before I was going to publish the article), Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar held a press conference over the issue. The CEC tried to hold Rahul accountable for his allegations and demanded him to either present affidavit with his allegations within 7 days, or ‘apologize” to the nation.

However, despite these headline grabbing lines, the CEC failed to give reasonable explanations to the serious lapses presented by Rahul. Saying there can be many people with same doesn’t cut, as their father’s name and other address details will be different. Similarly, giving ‘House No. 0’ to homeless people is also indigestible reasoning. Once again, the EC didn’t even respond to the cases of 80 people registered in one house, ‘EGHJKLU’ sort of father’s names and elderly people voting through Form-6. The most absurd reason was not sharing CCTV footage of the voting units citing privacy of women…they should’ve seriously thought a better excuse.

A Worrying Pattern

Also, this is not the first time that fingers have been pointed towards the ECI. Just months before, the Aam Aadmi Party alleged that massive discrepancies are taking place ahead of Delhi elections, through large-scale additions and deletions in key constituencies. Even in Maharashtra, the Congress party levelled some serious allegations of abnormal rise in number of voters in state, but none of this was worthy enough for the ECI to even give a proper factual reply.

An even worrying pattern has been the ECI brushing off accountability putting the whole onus on the Booth Level Officers (BLA) of each party, saying each party has its BLAs, so why the issue wasn’t pointed by them? Now, I haven’t heard a logic more stupid than this. Whose responsibility is it to hold free and fair elections? ECI or BLAs? Even if BLAs, out of incompetence or ignorance, didn’t point out any discrepancies, does that absolve the ECI of the responsibility, it’s bestowed with. The irresponsibility India’s poll body is showing, is beyond baffling.

I already highlighted in my previous blogs how the Modi government brought the bill to remove Chief Justice from the committee to select the election commissioners, replacing him with a union minister (Amit Shah in every case). Ever since then, and even before that, the EC’s role as a neutral umpire has been under immense scrutiny and the public’s trust in the poll body has been receding continuously, in what is a worrying sign for the ‘Mother of Democracy’.

Last year, BJP suffered a major embarrassment when the presiding officer of the Chandigarh mayoral polls was openly and blatantly defecting the ballot votes of AAP and Congress and was caught in CCTV. Following that the government brought another rule that all CCTV footages and voter rolls will be ‘destroyed’ in 45 days if no complaints come. The government and EC have cited ‘voter privacy’ as the reason, but can anyone seriously point out any logic in this? If there is no wrong intent, then why such petty (chindi as we say in Hindi) moves?

Another such petty (chindi) move was seen after Rahul made teh charges in his presser and demanded the EC to give ‘searchable’ digital voter rolls. Not just the EC refused again citing ‘voter privacy’ but instead the digital list of names in Bihar’s voter roll, which were present on the web, were also turned ‘non-searchable’. Now, can anyone genuinely say why any body would do such a thing, if it doesn’t have anything to hide.

Has Opposition cracked a ‘Jackpot’ against struggling Modi?

After BJP was reduced to 240 seats in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, it seemed Modi’s juggernaut will only go downhill from here, but proving everyone wrong it marked massive wins in Haryana, Maharashtra and Delhi. And just when Modi’s BJP seemed back in its form heading into the crucial Bihar elections, Rahul Gandhi came up with this serious and powerful issue, which has actually shaken the political discourse.

After months of massive friction within the INDIA bloc, the opposition came together for the joint protest against the Election Commission. And now, building on to that, Rahul has kickstarted the ‘Vote Adhikar Yatra’ in Bihar, which will span across 14 days. In my opinion, the LoP has played the very right card by calling this march at this juncture. Building on to his charges, if he is able to actually take this issue among the people, it can be gamechanger. Because, unlike Adani, Rafale or Pegasus, the issues which didn’t concern an average citizen, this issue of ‘vote theft’ actually concerns every single one of us and will resonate deeper. Keep in mind, Rahul doesn’t have to prove the charges just as of now, only by creating this ‘doubt’ in voter’s mind, he can be the great disruptor.

These allegations couldn’t have come at a worse time for Mr Modi, India’s ageing prime minister (will turn 75 next month) facing anti-incumbency into his third term. Few months ago, India carried out Operation Sindoor, which though was successful in its strategic aim, but left many questions over the abrupt ceasefire. Since then, the opposition hasn’t failed to latch onto it, as well as over the security failure in Pahalgam. Mr Modi is also battling a huge challenge against the tariffs imposed by US President Trump and his sudden ‘anti-India’ turn. Foreign policy, which was a strong tool of Modi’s BJP for the last decade, is slowly turning out as the double-edged sword for the ruling party. In addition to this, now he has a challenge domestically too.

So, that’s where the situation stands today. Rahul’s allegations are unarguably serious, but hasn’t received a serious response from country’s poll body, mainstream media and the blind support base. It should be noted that the issue is not just about BJP v Congress, but about ‘We the people of India’ and their very right that makes the country a democracy. On Supreme Court’s directive, the ECI has released the names of 65 lakh voters whose names were deleted (so far). There have already been multiple reports highlighting discrepancies in Bihar’s electoral rolls too. So, what now gets unraveled from this list and how the opposition is able to play the issue in Bihar – in addition to the local issues of Bihar like unemployment, crime and development, which are getting ignored amid the SIR debate – will define not just the state polls but also the national politics for some time. I think, one can fasten the seatbelts for some interesting political developments.

JAI HIND