By Arpita Ghosh

Copyright timesnownews

Congress leader and Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi on Thursday accused Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar of shielding “vote chors” and those “destroying democracy”. He alleged that Congress supporters’ votes were being systematically removed ahead of elections, citing figures from Aland Assembly constituency in Karnataka. Speaking at a press conference at the party’s Indira Bhawan headquarters, Gandhi demanded that the Election Commission act immediately. He said the poll body must provide, within a week, the information sought by the Karnataka CID in its probe into alleged voter deletions. Here are the key takeaways from his press conference: -CEC ‘protecting’ people who have ‘destroyed’ Indian democracy -Some groups of people ‘systematically targeting’ millions of voters for purpose of deletion; minorities, Dalits targeted Also Read: ‘Congress’ Voters Deleted’: Rahul Gandhi Goes All Out Against EC, Says ‘H-Bomb Also Coming’ -In Karnataka’s Aland, 6018 deletion applications were filed by impersonators to target Congress voters. He said, “Aland is a constituency in Karnataka; 6,018 votes. Somebody tried to delete 6,018 votes. We don’t know the total number of votes that were deleted in Aland in the 2023 election. They’re likely much higher than 6,018.” “But somebody got caught deleting 6,018 votes, and it was caught, like most crimes, by coincidence. What happened was the booth-level officer noticed that her uncle’s vote was deleted. So, she checked who deleted her uncle’s vote and found it was a neighbor. However, neither the person deleting the vote nor the person whose vote was deleted knew; some other force hijacked the process and deleted the vote, and, as luck would have it, got caught. What does the operation look like? In Aland, 6,018 applications were filed, impersonating voters. The people who allegedly filed these applications never actually filed them,” he claimed. -This deletion of votes done in centralised manner using software and not through individuals. -Targeted deletions in strong Congress booths. The top 10 booths with maximum deletions were Congress strongholds. Congress won 8 out of the 10 booths in 2018. This was not a coincidence; this was a planned operation. -Karnataka CID has started investigation seeking details from EC on deletions done, but EC not providing details -EC is defending ‘murderers’ of democracy by not providing details of voter deletions. -Mass deletion of voters in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Haryana, UP; CEC needs to stop protecting people ‘murdering’ Indian democracy. -This is another example of ‘vote chori’ through deletion of votes; CEC should provide details of ‘vote deletions’ within a week. -This is still not the Hydrogen bomb, it is coming, he said. Also Read: Rahul Gandhi Press Conference Live Updates Earlier, on September 1, addressing the concluding event of his Voter Adhikar Yatra, Gandhi had said his party will soon come out with a “hydrogen bomb” of revelations about “vote chori” and after that Prime Minister Narendra Modi will not be able to show his face to the country. Last month, Gandhi, citing data from the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, had claimed that over one lakh votes were “stolen” through manipulation in Mahadevapura assembly segment in Karnataka, and asserted that “vote chori” is an “atom bomb on our democracy”. Get Latest News Live on Times Now along with Breaking News and Top Headlines from India and around the world.