Rahul claims proof of poll fraud BJP-EC 'collusion' BJP says 'calculated deceit' EC asks for signed declaration

New Delhi, Aug 7 (PTI) Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday made explosive claims of a "huge criminal fraud" in polls through "collusion" between the BJP and the Election Commission and called it "a crime against the Constitution", as he cited an analysis of voter rolls in a constituency in Karnataka last year.
     Soon after Gandhi levelled the charge asserting that "vote chori"(vote theft) is an "atom bomb on our democracy", the Chief Electoral Officers of Karnataka and Maharashtra asked the former Congress chief to share names of electors he claimed were "wrong" in the voters' list along with a signed declaration for poll authorities to initiate "necessary proceedings" in the matter.
     Addressing a press conference at the Congress headquarters, Gandhi also alleged that the Maharashtra Assembly poll results last year confirmed the Congress' suspicion that the election was 'stolen'.
     The BJP, on the other hand, hit out at Gandhi and termed his allegation a "calculated deceit" and accused the Congress of "systematically" attacking the constitutional institutions under a larger conspiracy against India's democracy and Constitution.
     Gandhi said what his party had collected through research was "criminal evidence" and alleged that the EC was busy destroying such proof across the country.
     Making a presentation, Gandhi said his party analysed voter data of the Mahadevapura Assembly segment in the Lok Sabha constituency of Bangalore Central from the 2024 Lok Sabha polls and claimed that over 1 lakh votes were "stolen" through five types of manipulation.
     He claimed that there was "vote chori" of 1,00,250 votes in the Mahadevapura segment, with 11,965 duplicate voters, 40,009 voters with fake and invalid addresses, 10,452 bulk voters or single address voters, 4,132 voters with invalid photos and 33,692 voters misusing Form 6 of new voters which included those above 90 years.
     The Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha also said the judiciary needs to get involved in this because "the democracy that we love so much, does not exist anymore".
     "'Vote chori' is an atom bomb on our democracy," he said in a post on X soon after the presser. He said the Congress party would hold a protest march against this "fraud" on Friday at Freedom park in Bengaluru.
     "I want the nation to know that there is a huge criminal fraud being perpetrated across the country. It is being done by the Election Commission and the party in power and we have given you crystal clear and undoubtable evidence here."
     "This is a crime that is being committed against the Indian Constitution, against the Indian flag. This is nothing less than that," Gandhi said, alleging poll rigging in various parts of the country.
     Later in the evening, Gandhi made a similar presentation to leaders of various opposition parties whom he had invited for a dinner meeting.
     EC sources said Gandhi should either sign a declaration under the Conduct of Election Rules and submit the list of people wrongfully included in voters' list or he should "stop misleading" the people of India and "stop making baseless allegations" against the poll authority.
     The sources said the Chief Electoral Officer of Karnataka is expecting a signed declaration from Gandhi by this evening.
     In a letter to Gandhi, the state poll officer said, "You are kindly requested to sign and return the enclosed declaration/oath under Rule 20(3)(b) of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, along with the name(s) of such elector(s) so that necessary proceedings can be initiated."
     Gandhi hit back at the EC for demanding his signed declaration on his claims, saying he made the remarks publicly and they can "take it as an oath".
     He claimed that the EC is "very scared" to attack him and did not act against him, as it knows that he is speaking the truth.
     Slamming Gandhi, the BJP accused him of insulting the "discerning decision" of the people of the country by calling its election victory a "fraud". It said the voters will continue to reject the Congress for such "irresponsible and shameless" character and conduct.
     Union Minister Dharmendra Pradhan labelled Gandhi "bayan bahadur" (someone who makes tall claims).
     "The ideologically hollow Congress party is systematically attacking constitutional institutions. It cannot be ruled out that there is a larger conspiracy against India's democracy and Constitution behind this calculated deceit," the senior BJP leader said in a post on X.
     BJP MP and former Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad said Gandhi has made "irresponsible and shameless comments" and by calling the EC a fraud, he has crossed all limits of "shamelessness".
     Maharashtra chief minister Devendra Fadnavis and Deputy Chief Minister Eknath Shinde dubbed as "baseless" the claims of Gandhi, saying the Congress leader has the habit of levelling allegations after losing elections.
     Rahul Gandhi had also claimed that Prime Minister Narendra Modi is the PM with a slender majority and needed to "steal" only 25 seats to stay in power, and added that the BJP won 25 seats in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls with less than 33,000 votes.
     The EC is colluding with the BJP and helping them, he alleged, asking the poll panel to provide the data the Congress wants if it is not partaking in the crime.
     Gandhi claimed that an internal poll survey indicated that Congress was expected to win 16 of the 28 seats in Karnataka (in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections), but won nine seats. He said the party focused on seven unexpected losses and chose the Mahadevapura Vidhan Sabha constituency and took all data from the 2024 elections sourced from the Election Commission.
     Gandhi cited data to say that that in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, the BJP secured 6,58,915 votes in the Bangalore Central seat, winning with a margin of 32,707.
     "In the Mahadevapura assembly segment, the Congress received 1,15,586 votes, whereas the BJP garnered 2,29,632 votes.
     "The Congress won all the Vidhan Sabha segments except Mahadevapura, where the BJP swept and secured a victory margin of 1,14,046 votes. This seat significantly contributed to their election win, and the Lok Sabha result went in their favour on that seat," he said.
     "This discrepancy is a huge imbalance. So, we started examining the details and discovered that approximately 1,00,250 votes were stolen in the Mahadevapura assembly," he claimed.
     "We see there is a pattern, we are absolutely convinced that this crime is being done on a huge scale across the country in state after state. CCTV footage and voter list are evidence of crime and the Election Commission is trying to destroy it," he alleged.
     Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah backed Gandhi's allegations on "vote theft".
     “Under the guidance of Shri Rahul Gandhi, a detailed six-month investigation was conducted into the voter records of Mahadevapura Assembly segment. The probe uncovered precise evidence of systematic 'vote theft',” Siddaramaiah said in a post on 'X'. PTI ASK/SKC PK NAB KR GMS GSN GSN
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(This story has not been edited by THE WEEK and is auto-generated from PTI)