Kharge’s letter an attempt to push a biased narrative: EC
Congress president has raised ‘discrepancies’ in the voting data; the poll panel’s rebuttal was made public before a scheduled meeting between the INDIA bloc delegation and the commission
The Election Commission (EC) rebutted a letter written by Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge to his colleagues in the INDIA bloc parties on the alleged “discrepancies in voting data” released by the election panel. The EC called Mr. Kharge’s letter an “attempt to push a biased narrative under the guise of seeking clarications”.
The rebuttal was released just an hour before the scheduled meeting of the INDIA bloc leaders with the EC, where apart from the voter turnout data, the leaders also questioned the EC’s inaction on complaints against Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah. They also ¡agged the Uttar Pradesh Police’s practice of issuing “red cards” to individuals, asking them to stay away from polling stations on voting day. At the meeting, according to sources, the leaders expressed dismay at EC’s public rebuttal.
Mr. Kharge’s letter to chiefs of other INDIA parties, which he also posted on social media, cast doubts on the EC’s functioning
and wondered whether the “unusual spike” in the nal voter turnout in comparison to the one released at the end of the day, was an attempt to “doctor” the nal results.
“Though in the genre of internal correspondence within a political party grouping, yet you have chosen to make the same public,” the EC noted. Placing such a letter in the public domain in the middle of the ongoing electoral process was designed to “create confusion, misdirection and an impediment to the conduct of smooth, free and fair elections”, the panel said.
“Through innuendos and insinuations, the contents of the post, tend to create disharmony in respect of the delicate space
of election management, can plant doubts in the minds of voters and political parties and potentially created an anarchic situation, when you said ‘could this be an attempt to doctor the nal results?’ which this commission hopes you do not have any intention of,” the EC said.
The EC said it nds a “pattern” in a series of past and present irresponsible statements from the Congress, and called it “disconcerting.’’
Addressing reporters at the end of the one-hourlong meeting, Congress leader Abhishek Manu Singhvi said that broadly two issues were raised. “We spoke about the great trust decit, feeling of alarm and distress that 11 complaints by the Congress
alone and 15-20 complaints in total by all parties put together against the Honourable Prime Minister and Home Minister have not been addressed,” he said. “If they [EC] don’t act promptly, it is a complete abdication of their constitutional duty,” he said.
On the issue of delay in releasing details of voter turnout and not explaining the “unusual” spike, Mr. Singhvi, said, “The dierence between the provisional gures and the nal one, for the three phases of polling, was over 5%. This, in comparison to the corresponding gures from 2019 when the dierence ranged from 1% to 2.5%, is directly double,” he said.
No assurance
The EC did not, as per at least three leaders who attended the meeting, give any assurance on the issues raised by the Opposition, though it agreed on one matter raised by Samajwadi Party MP Javed Ali Khan. “The Uttar Pradesh Police have been handing out ‘red cards’ to some people... Calling it a gross violation of the voter’s right, the EC has assured us that they will direct the Uttar Pradesh Police to stop the practice,” Mr. Khan said.