The INDIA alliance kicked off its high-decibel Chalo Dilli protest rally in Delhi on Sunday, with top opposition leaders marching towards Ramlila Maidan to demand the resignation of the Chief Election Commissioner and protest against alleged vote theft, while accusing the ruling BJP of conspiring against the poor and disrupting local businesses.

The INDIA alliance kicked off its high-decibel Chalo Dilli protest rally in Delhi on Sunday, with top opposition leaders marching towards Ramlila Maidan to demand the resignation of the Chief Election Commissioner and protest against alleged vote theft, while accusing the ruling BJP of conspiring against the poor and disrupting local businesses.

The INDIA alliance kicked off its high-decibel Chalo Dilli protest rally in Delhi on Sunday, with top opposition leaders marching towards Ramlila Maidan to demand the resignation of the Chief Election Commissioner and protest against alleged vote theft, while accusing the ruling BJP of conspiring against the poor and disrupting local businesses.

The INDI Alliance protest rally has begun in Delhi on Sunday, with bloc leaders moving in an open vehicle from the the Minto Road-Connaught Place junction towards the Ramlila Maidan. The leaders were accompanied by thousands of supporters, kicking off the high-decibel 'Chalo Dilli' mega march seeking the ouster of Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar.  

The rally is being led by Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi,  Congress general secretary Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, SP chief Akhilesh Yadav, TMC's Mamata Banerjee and Abhishek Banerjee, CPI(M)'s MA Baby, CPI's D Raja, CPI(ML) Liberation general secretary Dipankar Bhattacharya, JKNC's Farooq Abdullah, PDP's Mehbooba Mufti, among others. They then slowly moved towards Ramlila Maidan under the "Vote Bachao, Desh Bachao' march, with a crowd of supporters and workers walking alongside.

A huge crowd had already thronged the venue from around 1:30 pm. Hundreds of party supporters and their youth and student organisations displayed placards and raised slogans against the SIR exercise, demanding the resignation of Kumar.

‘Army of monkeys’

INDIA bloc leaders and their supporters hit out at the BJP, with senior Congress MP Kapil Sibal on Sunday described the INDIA bloc's mega rally as "the beginning of the end" for the Bharatiya Janata Party-led (BJP) government in the Centre.
"This is the beginning of the end of BJP," Sibal said. Himachal Pradesh Chief Minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukhu also demanded the resignation of the Chief Election Commissioner. "Gyanesh Kumar should resign," Sukhu said.

Telangana Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy likened Congress workers to an "army of monkeys" (Vannar Sena) arriving to defeat Prime Minister Narendra Modi, whom he called "the Ravana”.
Speaking at Telangana Bhavan in the capital, Reddy said the fight against "vote theft" would be waged at the venue. "Our army of monkeys has arrived to defeat Modi, the Ravana. We will wage a battle against vote theft at Ramlila Maidan. As many as 13.5 crore votes have already been deleted. Another 20 crore votes will be deleted in the coming days. Votes belonging to the poor are being removed. Conspiracies are being hatched to bring Modi back to power. Despite trains being stopped, people turned up in large numbers," he said.

Forcibly shut down shops

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Sunday alleged that the BJP had "forcibly" shut the shops at Connaught Place, and asserted that the country is watching how the ruling party is causing loss to the shopkeepers.

Gandhi said the INDIA bloc had appealed to those attending the opposition bloc's rally to do their shopping here, so that the shopkeepers could benefit. "But upon reaching Connaught Place, we learned that the BJP has forcibly shut down all the shops. The country is watching how the BJP is causing loss to the shopkeepers," Gandhi said.

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