Opinion Express View on Rahul Gandhi’s vote chori claims: The EC must answer

Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi’s allegations of “vote chori (theft)” in the 2024 Karnataka Lok Sabha election fit a firming pattern. Before this, Gandhi had made accusations of “match-fixing” in last year’s Maharashtra assembly election. There, the charges were framed with a broader brush — beginning with the appointment process of election commissioners, and going on to cite spikes in aggregate turnout figures. In Karnataka, Gandhi’s accusation that over 1 lakh votes were fraudulent in the Mahadevapura assembly segment of the Bangalore Central Lok Sabha seat, is based on assessments made by his team. In both sets of allegations, however, there is the same problem — the dots can be connected only by a political suspension of disbelief. It is one thing to point out that there are duplicate voters or invalid addresses or misuse of Form 6 given to first-time voters. It is quite another thing to take a leap from there to say that the Election Commission has colluded with the BJP to steal the Karnataka election. That the electoral rolls are not pure is a reason why they need to be revised from time to time — the EC’s ongoing Special Intensive Revision is a bad example because it shifts the burden of proof on voters and sets impractical timelines ahead of the Bihar election, but the exercise is periodically much-needed. So yes, Gandhi’s revelations of irregularities in Karnataka’s electoral rolls need to be investigated, and they call for corrective action by the EC. But there is simply no evidence, only political conspiracy theory, to back the claim that all the impurities in the electoral rolls, in Karnataka or elsewhere, are engineered to benefit the BJP — incidentally, the final Karnataka electoral rolls that Gandhi is now spotlighting, were made public and all recognised parties, including Congress, provided a copy, last year in January.

Evidently, Rahul Gandhi has taken a political call to make the allegation of the stolen election the Congress campaign’s centrepiece. So far, this has hardly any takers among Congress allies. Even apart from the fact that it could arguably further isolate it in the INDIA bloc, this has important and sobering implications for the Congress’s own politics. By claiming electoral “fraud” only when it loses, India’s main Opposition party is letting itself off the hook in times of BJP dominance. It is saying that it need not look within, to enhance its repertoire of ideas or work on its organisational health and political agility. Because, after all, it did not lose the election, the election was stolen from it. For a party that has been on the downswing, ceding ground to the BJP and also to an array of regional parties, this is self-serving and fraught with political peril.

Advertisement

That said, with the tenor of its response to the LoP, the EC does both itself and the Opposition party a disservice. Even if the claims are specious or speculative, coming from the LoP they need a substantive response — every time they are raised. By insisting that Gandhi submit a formal declaration under oath, the poll monitor is quibbling. Only last week, the EC suspended four election officials in West Bengal for alleged electoral roll manipulation. It needs to respond to Gandhi’s allegations with the same alacrity. Amid a climate of distrust and a polarising politics, the question of who is a citizen, and who isn’t, will only become more salient. The EC must recover its institutional voice to deal with the challenge. It should not keep invoking Article 324 as its shield — or let the government speak for it. Or, worse, sound, in its peeved responses, like a spokesperson for the ruling party.