“Did Rahul Gandhi drop an ‘atom bomb’ on the ECI?

This article was last updated on August 11, 2025

Canada: Oye! Times readers Get FREE $30 to spend on Amazon, Walmart…
USA: Oye! Times readers Get FREE $30 to spend on Amazon, Walmart…“Did Rahul Gandhi drop an ‘atom bomb’ on the ECI?

India is known as the world’s largest democracy, and elections held here attract attention from all over the globe. Many times, leaders and representatives from other countries visit India during elections to see and understand how voting is done in such a big country. The Election Commission of India (ECI) is often praised for handling these large elections successfully. However, there are often claims of cheating or unfair practices during elections. In the past, some national and state elections in India have given results that were completely different from all the pre-election surveys. Also, ever since voting started using Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), people have questioned whether the voting is fair. Even some top leaders from the Bharatiya Janata Party, like L.K. Advani, Subramanian Swami, and G.V.L. Narasimha Rao, have questioned the reliability of EVMs and have opposed their use at different times.

After the BJP came to power in 2014, the credibility of EVM started being questioned more frequently by opposition parties. Over the past decade, almost every election has seen numerous allegations of fraud related to EVM, including allegations of machine swapping, theft, and claims from voters that their VVPAT (Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail) receipts sometimes showed a vote cast for a different symbol than the one they chose. Although, despite these concerns, several opposition parties have managed to form governments in various states, the opposition’s protests against EVMs have continued. There have been EVM protest demonstrations at Delhi’s Jantar Mantar and a significant section of the country’s lawyers has also openly supported the anti-EVM stance. However, the government and the Election Commission of India have consistently maintained confidence in EVMs. The controversy has now moved beyond just EVM reliability to also include allegations of extensive manipulation in voter lists, with recent exposés by Leader of opposition in parliament, Rahul Gandhi drawing attention to these issues.

On August 7, 2025, Rahul Gandhi before a huge press conference accused large-scale election fraud in the Mahadevapura Assembly constituency of Karnataka, focusing on irregularities in voter lists. He claimed that out of 6.5 lakh total voters, over 1 lakh fake voters were added, which led to the BJP’s victory margin of 1,14,046 votes in that area. His allegations included duplicate voters, fake and invalid addresses, bulk voters at single addresses, invalid photos, and misuse of Form 6 (for first-time voters). He claimed multiple instances of one person voting in several booths, across different states, and accused the Election Commission of India (ECI) and BJP of collusion in this “huge criminal fraud.” Gandhi warned officials involved, calling their actions “anti-national,” promising Congress would hold them accountable. He described the evidence gathered after six months of work as a “nuclear bomb” that would expose the EC’s role and said there would be no place left to hide.

In fact, at Rahul Gandhi’s request, the Election Commission had sent him a huge bundle of papers weighing almost three quintals. Rahul, along with his experts, selected only 4 kilograms of these papers and studied their data very carefully. When a major vote theft was detected within this paper data, Rahul Gandhi reached the conclusion that if these 4 kilograms of papers are fake, then the remaining hundreds of kilograms of papers are also fake. Thus, the issue is not just about the Mahadevapura Assembly constituency, but about every Assembly and Lok Sabha seat election in the country. This is the reason Rahul Gandhi is now demanding voter data for all 543 Lok Sabha seats in India. He is specifically demanding “machine-readable” data so that data and photo analysis can be done. The Congress believes that if the Election Commission provides the machine data, then within just 7 days every single voter’s identity can be verified, making the need for SIR (Systematic Identification and Removal) obsolete. Moreover, using the machine data, all fake voters such as Rohingyas, Bangladeshis, Pakistanis, or Nepalese — essentially any fraudulent voters — will be revealed.

“However, it is surprising that for the first time in Indian history, such serious allegations are being made against the Election Commission by a person holding the important position of Leader of the Opposition. The entire government and even the Prime Minister are being called a fake government and a fake Prime Minister. However, both the BJP and the Election Commission are trying to hide behind each other. They are repeating the old tune that Rahul Gandhi’s allegations are ‘baseless,’ ‘shameful,’ and ‘an insult to democracy.’ According to BJP leaders, these allegations are the result of the Congress’s frustration after its defeat. They have challenged the Congress to take the legal route and defended the Election Commission’s ‘impartiality.’ At the same time, the BJP has described this as an attack on constitutional institutions by the Congress.”

“Remember the allegation made by Union Minister Nitin Gadkari, in which he said that the names of three and a half lakh voters were deleted in his Lok Sabha constituency. Who ordered these names to be deleted? Why were they deleted? If the Election Commission is not responsible for such irregularities, then whose responsibility is it? On whose direction is this done? Is this not a ‘conspiracy’ against the democratic structure of the country? Rahul Gandhi also alleged that in Maharashtra, in just five months, about 40 lakh suspicious voters were added to the voter list, raising doubts about the impartiality of the electoral process. Meanwhile, in Maharashtra itself, many candidates were heard saying that at most booths controlled by BJP, after 5 PM, a large crowd of ‘unknown voters’ gathered. Who were these voters and where did they come from? The Election Commission should give a satisfactory answer to every doubt and allegation of the Leader of Opposition so that the country and the world can know and understand that elections in the world’s largest democracy, India, are conducted fairly. And those self-proclaimed ‘Chanakyas’ of such conspiracies should be exposed and charged for anti-national acts. Otherwise, asking Rahul for an affidavit appears to be just an excuse to hide from his serious allegations.

By Author   Tanveer Jafri     Contact: – tjafri1@gmail.com     

(About the Author)

Author  Tanveer Jafri is a columnist based in India.He is related with hundreds of most popular daily news papers/magazines and news portals in India and abroad. Jafri, Almost  writes in the field of communal harmony, world peace, anti communalism, anti terrorism, national integration, national & international politics etc.He is a devoted social activist for world peace, unity, integrity & global brotherhood. Thousands of articles of the author have been published in different newspapers, websites & newsportals throughout the world. He is also a recipient of so many awards in the field of Communal Harmony & other social activities. (Email : tjafri1@gmail.com )