INDIA bloc against EC: Claims and counterclaims are numerous as fight intensifies over ‘vote theft’ and Bihar SIR

The ongoing battle between the Congress party and the Election Commission (EC) over allegations of ‘vote chori’ has turned bitter. After allegations by the Congress and other opposition parties of ‘voter fraud’ and targeting of Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in Bihar, the EC held a press conference to counter the allegations.

Here is a list of the opposition’s allegations and the EC’s response

Congress: Allegations of ‘chori vote’ in 2024 Lok Sabha elections. On July 31, Congress MP Rahul Gandhi cited data from the 2024 Lok Sabha polls to claim that over one lakh votes were “stolen” in the Mahadevapura Assembly segment in Karnataka by five types of manipulation, including duplicate voters, fake and invalid addresses and single address voters.

ALSO READ | Won’t let ‘plot’ to ‘steal’ Bihar polls via SIR succeed: Rahul

Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar: Submit a signed affidavit to support the “vote theft” allegations, otherwise the allegations will be considered baseless and invalid. “Give an affidavit or apologize to the nation. There is no third option. If an affidavit is not given within seven days, it means all allegations are baseless,” Kumar said.

“More than a billion employees are engaged in the election exercise. Can the ‘chori vote’ take place in such a transparent process?” Kumar asked.

INDIA block: Opposition parties have launched the ‘Vote Adhikar Yatra’ in Bihar to intensify their attack on the Bihar SIR of electoral rolls.

THIS : The SIR exercise was aimed at eliminating all gaps in the electoral roll. The CEC recognized that there could be discrepancies in the electoral lists and asserted that the SIR was the only way to correct this situation.

Congress: Allegations of double voting. There have been reports of several personalities in Bihar possessing two voter ID cards.

THIS : A person appearing on several electoral lists does not automatically mean that he or she has also voted several times. “Consciously or unconsciously, some people have ended up having multiple voter cards due to migration and other issues. »

Opposition: Leaders have questioned the timing of the revision of electoral rolls in Bihar.

THIS : It is a myth that the SIR was carried out in haste. The CEC stressed that it is the legal duty of the EC to correct the electoral roll before each election.

Opposition: Parties have been pressuring the EC to provide a machine-readable digital copy of Maharashtra’s electoral rolls, alleging irregularities in the 2024 state elections.

THIS : Kumar recalled that the Supreme Court, in a 2019 judgment, had banned the sharing of machine-readable electoral rolls as such an act would violate the privacy of voters. “We need to understand the difference between a machine readable voters list and a searchable voters list. You can search for the voters list available on the Election Commission website by entering the EPIC number. You can also download it. This is not called machine readable.

“As far as machine-readable is concerned, in 2019 the Supreme Court also studied this subject in depth and held that giving a machine-readable voters’ list can violate the privacy of the voter…Machine-readable voters’ list is banned. This decision of the Election Commission is after the Supreme Court judgment and is from 2019,” Kumar said.

ALSO READ | Bihar SIR: SC orders EC to disclose identities of 65 lakh deleted voters by August 19; the voting body agrees