Election Commission will hold a press conference today amid allegations of ‘vote theft’

New Delhi
The Election Commission of India (ECI) has announced that it will organize an important press conference at the National Media Center in New Delhi at 3 pm today. This information is given by the Director General (Media) of the Commission. In this press conference, senior officials of the Election Commission can share important announcements and updates, which may be related to the upcoming elections and voter list amendment.

In addition, the Election Commission of India, surrounded by serious allegations of ‘vote theft’, can now clarify its position on these allegations. In fact, this press conference is taking place at a time when opposition parties, especially the Congress and its leader Rahul Gandhi have questioned the impartiality of the Commission by alleged in alleged rigging and ‘vote theft’ in the voter list.

Continuation of allegations of ‘vote theft’
Over the last few months, especially after the 2024 Lok Sabha elections and subsequent assembly elections, opposition parties have alleged wide -scale irregularities in the voter list. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, in a press conference in New Delhi on August 7, cited the Mahadevpura assembly constituency of Bengaluru Central Lok Sabha seat in Karnataka, claiming that about 1,00,250 votes were stolen. He made serious allegations such as duplicate voters, fake addresses, and the names of hundreds of voters on the same address in the voter list. Rahul also said that if it had not been rigged, the Congress could have won 16 Lok Sabha seats in Karnataka, but it got only 9 seats.

In addition, Rahul Gandhi also claimed irregularities in the voter list in the elections in Maharashtra and Haryana, which was said to add the names of millions of voters unusually in five months. He accused the Election Commission of collusion with the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and demanded that the commission be public and machine-readable voter list.

Although no official information has been shared yet about the agenda of the press conference, it is believed that the Election Commission may respond to the allegations of ‘vote theft’ being made by the Congress party.

Election Commission reply
In response to the allegations of the Congress leader, the Election Commission has already clarified its position several times. On 11 August, the Commission rejected the claims of Rahul Gandhi and opposition parties as “factually wrong and misleading”. The Commission said through a fact-check post on social media that the purity of the voter list is necessary for the strength of democracy and has followed the transparent process. The Commission quoted the Chief Electoral Officers of Karnataka, Uttar Pradesh, and Haryana, claiming that the names of some voters (such as Aditya Srivastava and Vishal Singh) by Rahul Gandhi were found only in the voter list of Karnataka, not in Uttar Pradesh or other states, as alleged.

The Haryana Chief Electoral Officer also issued a letter on 7 August that the voter list was prepared in a transparent manner under the Representation of the Representation of the Public Representation Act 1950 and the Electoral Registration Rules 1960, and the draft and final voter lists were shared with the Congress.
Explain that the Supreme Court directed the Election Commission on Thursday to publish details of 65 lakh voters removed from the draft voter list to increase transparency in the special intensive revision (SIR) of Bihar and also tell them for not including them. A bench of Justice Suryakant and Justice Joymalya Bagchi passed the order while hearing the petitions challenging the Election Commission’s decision to SIR of the voter list in Bihar. It said that the names of 65 lakh voters were in the voter list, but were removed from the draft list. The draft list was published on August 1.

The list of names of those who have died, who have migrated or have gone to other constituencies, were directed to display the panchayat level office and district level election officials with reasons. The bench emphasized widespread publicity through television news channels and radio through newspapers including local languages and English dainiks, so that people can be informed about the places where the list will be available.