‘CEC Gyanesh Kumar shielding vote thieves’: Rahul Gandhi alleges systematic deletion of Congress voters

Congress MP and Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, on Thursday launched a sharp attack on Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, accusing him of protecting those involved in what he described as a “systematic and centralized vote theft” operation by deleting votes of Congress supporters and marginalized communities.

Addressing a press conference in the national capital, Rahul Gandhi said this was not the long-promised “hydrogen bomb” revelation but an exposé of a pattern allegedly used to “steal votes” from electoral rolls across India.

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“I am making a claim about CEC Gyanesh Kumar after solid proof that is Black and White and absolutely clear — the CEC is protecting the people who are destroying Indian democracy,” he said.

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He backed his claims with a detailed presentation and documents which he described as clear evidence of ‘vote chori’ (vote theft) being carried out through digital manipulation of the electoral process.

Targeted deletion of voters

Citing multiple examples from the Aland constituency in Karnataka, he claimed that someone has been doing voter deletion in a systematic way.

“During our investigation, we found out that deletion requests are being filed online. Mobile numbers that are used are not of Karnataka but other states,” he said, adding “names of Congress voters were being deleted in a targeted manner.”

In one instance, he said a woman named Godabai, on whose request 12 voters were deleted, Rahul also showed a video statement of Godabai, who purportedly denied any knowledge about filing any deletion request.

In another example, a man named Suryakant was allegedly linked to the deletion of 12 voters in 14 minutes. One of the deleted voters, Babita, was also present at the press conference. Both Suryakant and Babita denied any knowledge of the deletion process.

“Suryakant ji and Babita didn’t know about it. The one who is deleting, his serial number is 1 in the EPIC card…two names.were deleted at 4.30 am within 36 seconds…,” Rahul said, claiming software was being used to carry out targeted deletions in Congress strongholds.

Karnataka CID investigation stalled

Rahul further said that the Karnataka CID began investigating the matter in early 2023, following complaints of mass voter deletions. He claimed the agency sent 18 letters to the Election Commission of India (ECI), requesting technical data such as OTP trails of f mobile number used, IP addresses of those numbers and other technical details but received no meaningful response.

“The CID investigation started in Feb 2023 and the first letter was sent to the ECI in March 2023. In August, ECI gave incomplete details that were of no use in the investigation. The CID sent 18 reminder letters but nothing happened….” he said.

Rahul further claimed that the Election Commission of Karnataka also wrote a letter to the ECI seeking the information but received no response.

“Now the question arises who is behind this? Whoever is behind this, he is doing it in a centralized way using softwares to delete votes…and this didn’t happen in the Aland constituency. While names were deleted in Aland, new voters were added in Rajora, Maharashtra in a similar manner,” he added.

He demanded that Gyanesh Kumar should perform his Constitutional duties and give the Karnataka CID the information it needs.

“Give this information within one week or the entire country will believe that you are complicit in the murder of the Constitution and aiding those who are stealing votes,” Gandhi said

He also said that the much-awaited “hydrogen bomb” exposé would be revealed in the coming days.