The National Election Commission hosted a press conference on Sunday to refute the allegations of vote rigging raised by Lok Sabha Opposition leader Rahul Gandhi. Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar also directly attacked the opposition leader. Just a day after this, INDIA Bloc is allegedly considering bringing an impeachment motion against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. The decision was reportedly taken at the meeting of INDIA bloc floor leaders on Monday.
This comes within a few days of Congress leader Rahul Gandhi raising allegations of vote rigging.
Can the Chief Election Commissioner be removed?
According to Article 324(5) of the Constitution, the Chief Election Commissioner can be removed in the same process as the Supreme Court judges. That is, an impeachment motion has to be passed in Parliament. To impeach the Chief Election Commissioner, a two-thirds majority in both houses of Parliament is required. Although the opposition does not have that number, Congress leader Imran Pratapgarhi said, “We will take a decision on this soon.”
A 1988 batch Indian Administrative Service officer of the Kerala Cadre, Gyanesh Kumar has a rich and varied experience working in both central and state governments. He has served as Secretary in Ministry of Parliamentary Affairs and Ministry of Cooperation.
Before his elevation as Chief Election Commissioner, Mr Kumar was serving as Election Commissioner since 15th of March last year. During his tenure as Election Commissioner, elections were held for the 18th Lok Sabha and Assemblies of Jammu and Kashmir, Haryana, Maharashtra, Jharkhand and Delhi.
What did Rahul Gandhi say about vote theft?
The Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha claimed large-scale manipulation of the electoral list by the ECI in collusion with the BJP. Rahul Gandhi has alleged that votes were stolen in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Haryana. He claims that the commission has tampered with voter information. This has given an advantage to the BJP. On August 7, Rahul Gandhi claimed that 1,00,250 votes were stolen from Mahadevpura assembly constituency in Bengaluru Central. The BJP won the Lok Sabha seat in this election. He alleged that the Election Commission has joined hands with the ruling party.
Among the issues Rahul Gandhi highlighted in the press conference were duplicate entries of individuals, addresses with house number zero, and dozens of voters from a small house.
Rahul Gandhi said on August 11 that the Opposition is protesting for the right to vote for every Indian and demanded a “clean and pure” voter list. The opposition leader said that the issue of alleged irregularities pointed out by him will “explode” soon as it is not related to a single constituency but the whole country. He further said that he would not submit a signed affidavit as sought by the Election Commission, and stated that the data analysed by the Congress to provide “proof” of “vote theft” has been collected from the official Election Commission website.
What did CEC Gyanesh Kumar say about Rahul Gandhi?
Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar on Sunday countered allegations of “vote chori” or electoral fraud to win elections levelled by the Congress and its leader Rahul Gandhi, and vouched for the voting process in the world’s largest democracy. He also said that no complaints would be accepted on the draft list of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) being conducted in Bihar after September 1.
Gyanesh Kumar virtually taunted Lok Sabha opposition leader Rahul Gandhi without naming him for spreading confusion by using offensive words like ‘vote theft’. On this day, Gyanesh Kumar claimed, “Politics is being done by putting a gun to the neck of the commission and targeting the people. An attempt is being made to mislead the common voters. Lies cannot be made true in this way.” Gyanesh Kumar challenged the Congress leader, saying, “Rahul Gandhi must file an affidavit with evidence of all the allegations made within 7 days. Otherwise, he will have to apologize to the countrymen.”
Without naming Rahul Gandhi, CEC Gyanesh Kumar said the “PPT presentation” saw “wrong analysis” of voter data. He challenged Congress leader Rahul Gandhi to submit an affidavit on his allegations within seven days or “apologise to the nation”.