‘Sign Declaration Or Apologise’: EC To Rahul Over ‘Vote Theft’ Claim, Slams Charges As ‘Baseles

The Election Commission of India on Friday countered Congress leader Rahul Gandhi over his latest allegations against the poll-body, accusing it of a large-scale electoral fraud and vote theft. The ECI asked Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha to either sign a formal declaration under the law or apologise to the nation for “raising absurd allegations”.

“It is a settled proposition that if law requires a certain thing to happen in a certain manner, then it should be done in that manner only and not in any other manner. Therefore, if Rahul Gandhi believes in his analysis and believes that his allegations against ECI are true, he should have respect for law and sign the Declaration or Apologise to the Nation for raising absurd allegations against ECI,” the poll body said, as reported by news agency ANI.

The poll body’s reaction comes following Rahul Gandhi on Thursday alleged a “vote theft” of more than a lakh took place in the Bengaluru Central Lok Sabha seat during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. He also accused the poll body of colluding with the BJP as he alleged that polling officers were involved in “electoral fraud”. He warned them against consequences when the Opposition returns to power at the Centre.

Following his claims, the Chief Electoral Officers of Karnataka and Maharashtra– the two states where Rahul Gandhi alleged vote theft– asked him to provide names of those voters who he claims were included or eliminated from the rolls. The Congress leader was also asked to submit a signed oath under Rule 20 (3) (b) of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, which is mandatory for the “necessary proceedings” to be initiated.

However, Rahul Gandhi  did not sign the poll body’s declaration, and instead said that he has already taken an oath of the Constitution in Parliament.

“The Election Commission demands an affidavit from me. It says that I must take an oath. I have already taken the oath of the Constitution in Parliament,” he said in Bengaluru earlier today.

Reacting to this, the Election Commission said: “Law provides a specific procedure for both making objections to the roll and for making appeal. Instead of availing the legal processes, he tried to sensationalise the issue by making baseless claims in media.”

‘Repeated A Tired Script’: EC Slams Rahul Gandhi’s Charges

The poll body hit back at Rahul Gandhi for “repeating a tired script,” which it said was previously done in 2018 by Kamal Nath, the then President MPCC. 

“In 2018, they tried to mislead the Supreme Court by producing documents from a private website to demonstrate that there are mistakes in the electoral rolls in as much as same face was shown again for as many as 36 voters. Wherein in reality, the defects were rectified around 4 months ago and the copy of the same was supplied to the party,” the Election Commission said.

“This was made a ground to seek the searchable pdf format for electoral rolls. The Court refused to accept the prayer of Kamal Nath. Now, in 2025, they, being aware that the same trick cannot be played in the Court, tried to mislead the people by claiming irregularities in the electoral rolls inter alia that same names are occurring at different places. In fact, the name of Aditya Srivastava which was alleged to be in three different States, was rectified months ago,” it added.