“Abhi picture baki hai,” Rahul Gandhi says; Kharge rebukes ‘chori ki sarkar’

As the INDIA bloc mounts a concerted campaign demanding accountability on the integrity and veracity of the electoral rolls from the Election Commission of India, Lok Sabha LoP Rahul Gandhi accused the ECI today of failing in its duty to enforce the 'one man, one vote' principle, while Rajya Sabha LoP Mallikarjun Kharge managed to finally be heard — despite considerable din — on the Bihar SIR.

Alluding to his recent allegations of irregularities in the voters' list per the Congress-led 'vote chori' campaign, he said on 12 August, Tuesday, "abhi picture baki hai" (the show's not over yet). Are there, then, more revelations to come?

At a meeting of Congress general secretaries, in-charges and heads of frontal organisations at the AICC's 24, Akbar Road office, party sources quoted Gandhi as saying that the Congress lost at least 48 Lok Sabha seats due to "Mahadevpura-like vote chori".

The sources said the party may bring to the fore a series of revelations about "vote chori" in other seats in the near future.

Yesterday, a protest march by INDIA bloc leaders to Nirvachan Sadan, the ECI headquarters in Delhi, saw prominent leaders — including NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar, Rajya Sabha LoP and Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, Rahul Gandhi and Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Trinamool MP Sagarika Ghose, Shiv Sena (UBT)'s Sanjay Raut and others —  detained by the Delhi Police.

Rueful Trinamool Congress MP Derek O'Brien later on 11 August, Monday, put forward the points the INDIA bloc leaders had wanted to place before the ECI in a social media post beginning 'Today. What REALLY happened to 300 elected MPs'.

O'Brien alleged, "MPs from Opposition parties had asked the EC for an appointment. We were NOT ALLOWED by Modi & Amit Shah’s police to reach the office of the EC. We were told we were being taken to the EC. But instead, were hustled into a police station. We were released at 2.10 pm. So, the entire Opposition could not reach Parliament on time."

The Trinamool MP's post then enumerated the demands and declarations the INDIA bloc wished to highlight to the ECI:

(1) Initiate an FIR against former CEC Rajeev Kumar for manipulation of the voters’ list;

(2) Going forward, implement digitisation of voters’ lists;

(3) No SIR should be conducted now: "No bulldozing SIR in Opposition-ruled states";

(4) No political party will share BLA-2 details (profile, contact, and photo) with the ECI, "as these will promptly reach the BJP".

"If the current voters’ list is full of flaws, the Union government should resign," the post adds.

Rahul Gandhi, too, in a post on his WhatsApp channel, said after he was released by the police: "The Election Commission arrested 300 opposition MPs. This is the state of democracy today! The government and the commission should listen, we are not just public representatives — we are the voice of the people of India, which cannot be suppressed."

"Against vote chori, for the protection of democracy and the Constitution, for the right of one person, one vote… INDIA is united," he said.

Gandhi also shared short clips of INDIA bloc leaders while they were detained at the Parliament Street police station.

"The theft of votes that is happening is very dangerous for our democracy. We have a clear demand from the EC that it should stop indulging in theft and prepare a fair and clean voter list, so that democracy is saved," Kharge could be heard saying in a clip.

NCP (SP) chief Sharad Pawar says in the clip that it is important that the truth comes out before the people.

Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav says "we will continue to fight for rights and justice despite all hurdles".

Today (12 August), speaking with reporters in the Parliament House complex, Rahul Gandhi asserted, "There is not just one seat (where there is vote chori) but there are a number of seats. This is being done at a national level and systematically. The EC knows it and we know it too."

The Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha added, "Evidence was not there earlier but now there is evidence. We protect the Constitution. 'One man, one vote' is the foundation of the Constitution," Gandhi said.

It is the duty of the ECI to enforce 'one man, one vote' but it has not done its duty, Gandhi alleged.

Asked about Minta Devi, the 124-year-old voter allegedly listed in the Election Commission's voter list from Bihar as a first-time voter, Gandhi said, "There are unlimited cases like that. Abhi picture baki hai."

Earlier on Tuesday, several MPs of the INDIA bloc parties held a protest in the Parliament House complex against the Election Commission's voter roll revision in Bihar, with many of them wearing white T-shirts with the name of the "124-year-old voter" allegedly found on Bihar's voters' list.

Kharge, Congress parliamentary party chief Sonia Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, O'Brien, DMK's T R Baalu, Supriya Sule of the NCP (SP) and other Opposition MPs from the DMK and Left parties gathered near the Makar Dwar to the parliament building, demanding the rollback of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise.

Opposition demands to discuss the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls in Bihar have seen daily protests within and outside Parliament during this monsoon session, with the treasury benches avoiding the issue under the pretext that the matter is sub judice and thus cannot be discussed.

The INDIA bloc upped the ante last Thursday, 7 August, when Rahul Gandhi held a press conference citing data from the 2024 Lok Sabha polls to claim that more than 1 lakh votes were "stolen" through five types of manipulation in the Mahadevapura assembly segment of Bangalore Central Lok Sabha seat in Karnataka.

Today, however, in Rajya Sabha, Mallikarjun Kharge managed to put in a 2-minute intervention on both the Bihar SIR and the vote chori allegation, with two INDIA bloc allies giving up their chance to speak to allow this issue to be amplified.

Kharge alleged that Advasis, Dalit, various minorities and OBC citizens are being excluded from voter rolls by the lakhs and there is a plan to extend SIR to other states such as Bengal and Assam to accommodate the BJP's 'chori ki sarkar' — though acting chairperson Sasmit Patra refused to allow his statement to go on record.

With PTI inputs