In a letter to President Droupadi Murmu, opposition parties have named seven states where they allege electoral manipulation, presenting the INDIA bloc as a grouping representing more than 60 per cent of the country's population. Congress insiders have previously claimed that all non-NDA parties were aligned with the INDIA bloc on the alleged 'vote theft' issue.
The states named are Haryana, Maharashtra, Chhattisgarh, Madhya Pradesh, Bihar, Delhi and West Bengal.
AAP Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Singh had reportedly claimed a few days ago that Congress's failure to include Delhi among the states it described as having been “stolen” suggested political undertones to its campaign. However, following opposition meetings and outreach to parties not aligned with the BJP, Congress leaders believe there is growing conviction among these parties that the issue goes beyond politics and concerns the protection of the Constitution.
Congress began intensifying its campaign against alleged vote theft after the 2023 Assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh and Chhattisgarh, where several party leaders believed the political climate favoured Congress, despite the BJP emerging victorious in both states. After subsequent defeats in Haryana and Maharashtra, the party began examining alleged additions to and deletions from electoral rolls. Congress was among the first political parties to accuse the Election Commission of facilitating electoral manipulation through such changes.
Out of the seven, states where regional parties have a stronger political base than Congress are TMC in West Bengal , RJD in Bihar and AAP in Delhi. However, regional parties in other states have also raised concerns over alleged discrepancies in electoral processes, bringing them into the wider opposition campaign.
The letter addressed to President Murmu stated: “We, the Members of Parliament of the INDIA group representing over 60% of the population of our country, approach you with grave alarm over the manner in which the entire election system and the democratic framework of India have been subverted by Narendra Modi, the Prime Minister and Amit Shah, the Home Minister, stealing from crores of Indians their constitutional Right to Vote. This has destroyed the very foundation of our democracy.”
The opposition representatives also claimed to possess incontrovertible evidence of vote theft on a massive scale across multiple elections.
“Both the EVMs and the electoral rolls have been completely manipulated by the BJP in several other Assembly and Lok Sabha elections. Democracy is being murdered in broad daylight. This is a crime against the nation, and the Chief Election Commissioner has blatantly cheated and lied to the Hon’ble Supreme Court of India to cover up this crime,” the letter said.
