Gandhi had launched a sharp attack on the Election Commission accusing it of colluding with the BJP to “steal elections” in the country. The Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha had alleged that fake names were being added to voter lists and cited electoral rolls from Karnataka’s Mahadevapura assembly segment in Bangalore Central as evidence.Calling it a case of “bhayankar chori” (massive theft) of votes, Gandhi claimed that out of 6.5 lakh votes in Mahadevapura, more than one lakh were fraudulent. He said Congress’s internal review had found 11,965 duplicate voters, 40,009 with fake or invalid addresses, 10,452 “bulk voters” registered at the same address, and 4,132 with invalid photos. He further alleged that 33,692 voters had misused Form 6, meant for new registrations.Bangalore Central saw a close contest in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, with Congress’s Mansoor Ali Khan initially leading before BJP’s PC Mohan won by 32,707 votes. Gandhi said Congress had won six of the seven assembly segments in the constituency but lost Mahadevapura by 1,14,000 votes, which he attributed to “vote theft.”He also criticised the EC for not providing voter lists in electronic format, arguing that machine-readable data could have exposed the alleged fraud “in 30 seconds.” Instead, he said, the commission supplied only “non-machine-readable papers,” forcing the party to spend six months on verification.The poll body has rejected the allegations, with sources saying it asked Gandhi to either submit signed evidence or refrain from making “baseless accusations.” The Karnataka election authority has also sought a signed affidavit detailing his claims and questioned why no formal complaint had been lodged.(With inputs from PTI)
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