Rahul Gandhi Alleges Massive Voter Fraud in Karnataka, Accuses Election Commission of BJP Collusion
Congress MP Rahul Gandhi launched a scathing attack on the Election Commission of India (ECI), alleging widespread voter fraud in Karnataka and accusing the poll watchdog of collusion with the BJP to rig recent elections. Speaking at a press conference, Gandhi claimed that fake voters, duplicate entries, and invalid addresses had been deliberately added to electoral rolls, citing internal research on the Mahadevapura assembly segment within the Bangalore Central Lok Sabha seat.
According to Gandhi, the Mahadevapura segment, which recorded around 6.5 lakh votes, experienced a “vote chori” or massive theft amounting to over one lakh votes. He pointed to findings of over one lakh duplicate voters and bulk voter registrations in that area alone.
The Congress leader also highlighted the narrow defeat of Congress candidate Mansoor Ali Khan by BJP’s PC Mohan, a margin of just 32,707 votes during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, implying the alleged irregularities influenced the outcome.
Gandhi further criticized the ECI for withholding voter lists in a machine-readable electronic format, suggesting that easy access to such data would reveal the alleged electoral rigging within seconds. “This is a challenge here. This is seven feet of paper. If I want to find out if you have voted twice or if your name occurs twice in the voter list, I have to take your picture, and then I have to compare it to every single bit of paper. It is a very tedious process,” he said.
He accused the Commission of intentionally providing voter lists in a format that resists optical character recognition and thus impedes analysis, stating, “These papers do not allow for optical character recognition… So, that it is not analysed.”
These serious allegations come ahead of a significant protest march planned by the Congress in Karnataka against the Election Commission over the purported voter irregularities. Rahul Gandhi is expected to lead this march, signaling the party’s determination to highlight what it terms as a “bhayankar chori” in the democratic process.
The Election Commission has not yet responded to Gandhi’s claims. However, such allegations raise pressing questions about the transparency and fairness of electoral roll maintenance, especially in closely fought constituencies. As Karnataka prepares for the upcoming protests, all eyes remain on the ECI’s next move amid growing demands for electoral reform and accountability.
