ECI shrugging all responsibilities in the face of grave allegations: Congress

New Delhi, Aug 16 (IANS) Congress General Secretary (Organisation) K.C. Venugopal on Saturday criticised the Election Commission of India (ECI), saying that the poll panel has crossed "all limits of shamelessness by shrugging all its responsibilities" amid serious allegations pertaining to vote theft and mass rigging.

His pointed reaction came hours after the ECI earlier in the day issued a sharp reminder to political parties about their role in ensuring error-free voter lists, stating that “some political parties and their Booth Level Agents (BLAs) did not examine the Electoral Rolls at the "appropriate time” and are now raising issues about errors, including those in rolls prepared in the past.

Taking to X, in a lengthy post, Venugopal wrote: "The ECI has crossed all limits of shamelessness by shrugging all its responsibilities in the face of grave allegations of vote theft and mass rigging. Constitutional authorities are expected to be the epitome of probity, not hide behind vaguely drafted press notes to hide their guilt in destroying democracy. The onus of catching the scale and volume of their vote theft cannot be on political parties and their BLAs."

The senior Congress leader said that ECI claims 'utmost transparency is the hallmark of electoral roll preparation'... we wish to ask ECI if any of these decisions are part of their agenda of promoting 'utmost transparency', followed by a few questions.

1. Denying machine-readable rolls to parties, and taking down already uploaded machine-readable versions of the draft SIR rolls

2. ⁠Deleting CCTV footage within 45 days

3. ⁠Submitting before the Supreme Court that it is not bound to disclose the reason behind deleting 65 lakh names in the Bihar SIR process

4. ⁠Refusing to meet opposition MPs marching to meet the ECI.

The Lok Sabha MP further criticised the poll panel, saying: "The tone and tenor of this press note raises greater suspicions that the ECI will take no steps to address the public’s grave concerns about mass-scale vote rigging done by the BJP-controlled ECI."

He said if the ECI “welcomes the scrutiny of electoral rolls”, the Chief Election Commissioner and other ECs must come clean on why they still refuse to provide parties with machine-readable electoral rolls and why CCTV footage is being deleted.

Earlier on Saturday, the Election Commission emphasised that India’s electoral roll preparation is a “multi-layered decentralised construct” involving Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) and Booth Level Officers (BLOs), who are responsible for the correctness of rolls.

After the draft voter lists are published, both digital and physical copies are shared with all political parties and uploaded to the ECI website, allowing a full month for claims and objections.

“Had these issues been raised at the right time through the right channels, it would have enabled the concerned SDMs/EROs to correct the mistakes, if genuine, before those elections,” the ECI stated.

The Commission reiterated that it “continues to welcome the scrutiny of Electoral Rolls by political parties and electors” as it helps in purifying the rolls.

The clarification comes amid political heat over voter list discrepancies in Bihar, where the opposition has accused the poll panel of lapses.

The timing is significant, as Congress leader Rahul Gandhi is set to launch his yatra in Bihar, a move expected to escalate the political spotlight on the state’s electoral processes.

The ECI detailed that transparency remains the hallmark of the electoral roll preparation process.

--IANS

pgh/