Stepping up his offensive against the Election Commission of India, senior Congress leader Rahul Gandhi today alleged the mass deletion of voters from Congress strongholds in Karnataka during the 2023 Assembly election. These voter IDs, he alleged, were deleted using fake logins and phone numbers from outside the state. He also alleged that this alleged voter deletion was being executed not by individuals, but with the use of software and in a centralised manner.
“In election after election, a group of people has been systematically targeting millions of voters for deletion across India, different communities, mainly communities that are voting for the Opposition. We have found 100 per cent proof of this. I love my country, I love the Constitution, I love the democratic process and I am protecting that process. I am not going to say anything here that is not going to be based on 100 per cent proof that you can determine. The judgment is yours,” he said.
Mr Gandhi alleged that in Aland, Karnataka, someone tried to delete 6,018 votes, but was caught due to a coincidence. “The booth-level officer noticed that her uncle’s vote was deleted, and she found her neighbour had deleted it. So, she asked the neighbour and he said he did not know about it. Neither the person who deleted the vote knew, nor the person whose vote was deleted knew. And as luck would have it, got caught,” he said.
“In Alund, 6,018 applications were filed impersonating voters. The people who filed these applications actually never filed them,” he alleged.
Targeting Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha said the Karnataka CID has sent 18 letters to the poll body in 18 months and sought information. The CID has sought information such as the destination IP of the device from where voter deletion forms were filled and OTP trails, he said. “They are not giving it because this will lead us to where the operation is being done from. This is absolute solid proof that Gyanesh Kumar is protecting the people who are doing this,” he said, adding that the alleged irregularities were being carried out on a big scale and using large resources.
Holding up a copy of the India Constitution, he said, “I want every single youngster to know that they are attacking this, and this is your future. When they are not giving this information, they are defending the murderers of our democracy. Your jobs, your future, your aspirations all come from this.”
During the press interaction, Mr Gandhi brought some people and said their numbers were used to delete voter IDs. The people, however, said they don’t know of this. He said some constituencies saw voter addition, while others saw deletion. “But the basic idea is the same, phones from outside, people who are supposed to have added voters don’t know they have added voters, people who have deleted voters don’t know they have deleted voters,” Mr Gandhi said.
“Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar needs to stop protecting the people who are destroying Indian democracy. EC has to release this data within a week. Otherwise, we will know for sure that Gyanesh Kumar is protecting people who are destroying and attacking the Constitution,” he said.