Form 7 misused to mass-delete voters before 2023 polls: Priyank Kharge

Karnataka minister Priyank Kharge on Thursday, 18 September, accused the previous BJP government of orchestrating large-scale voter deletions ahead of the May 2023 assembly polls by misusing Form 7, the application used to seek removal of names from electoral rolls.

His remarks came after Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, earlier in the day, alleged that votes of Congress supporters were being systematically deleted — citing Karnataka’s Aland Assembly constituency as an example. Rahul Gandhi claimed that in Aland alone, 6,018 deletions were attempted, of which 5,994 were fraudulent.

“Strong Congress booths, especially those with Dalit and minority voters, were targeted,” he alleged.

Kharge echoed the charge, calling it a “sophisticated vote chori factory.” He said automated software and fake logins were used to push bulk deletions, adding that in one case, 12 voters were deleted within just 14 minutes, and in another, a 63-year-old woman’s identity was misused to delete 12 voters. Verification later confirmed that 2,494 voters had already been deleted before the fraud was caught.

He further alleged that the Karnataka CID, which is investigating the case, has written 18 times to the Election Commission seeking IP logs, OTP trails, device IDs, and login details but has not received the information.

“This raises serious questions — who approved these deletions? Where is the OTP audit trail? Why is the ECI refusing to cooperate with CID? Whom is the Commission protecting?” Kharge asked.

Rahul Gandhi had also accused Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar of shielding “vote chors” and undermining democracy, charges that the EC has dismissed as “incorrect and baseless.”

With PTI inputs