Congress spokesperson Pawan Khera on Sunday slammed the Election Commission of India, saying Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar was speaking like a BJP leader.
"We had hoped that today he would answer our questions," said Khera as he slammed the CEC for arguing that the election panel could not share CCTV footage of polling booths as that would "breach voter privacy".
Responding to this, the Congress leader asked, "If you do not intend to share the footage, why do you event record it?"
Khera was taking part in the Vote Adhikar Rally in Bihar's Sasaram as the Congress and the RJD protest the Special Intensive Revison (SIR) ahead of the upcoming assembly elections.
Citing the poll panel's updated rules to retain the footage for 45 days before destroying them, Khera asked, "Why isn't privacy hampered in those 45 days?"
Congress party general secretary Jairam Ramesh said the ECI's incompetence and blatant partisanship have been exposed now, pointing out that Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi simply stated facts revealed by the poll panel.
Slamming the ECI officials for saying they make no distinction between the ruling party and the opposition, Ramesh said, "This is laughable, to put it very mildly, in the face of mountains of evidence to the contrary. Notably, the CEC answered none of the pointed questions raised by Shri. Rahul Gandhi meaningfully."
He added that all that matters now is whether the ECI will implement the August 14 orders of the Supreme Court regarding the Bihar SIR process.
Earlier in the day, CEC Gyanesh Kumar slammed Rahul Gandhi’s allegations of vote theft, claiming it is mandatory for a person to take an oath “as a witness" if he is not a voter of the constituency the complaint is being made for. It asked the LoP to submit affidavit within a week or apologise to the nation.