ECI rebuts voter fraud claims, says concerns must be raised during ‘Claims and Objections’ period

New Delhi: Amid allegations of voter fraud in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections by the Opposition, the Election Commission of India (ECI) on Saturday asserted that the correct time to raise issues with electoral rolls is during the “Claims and Objections” period prior to elections.

“Recently, some Political Parties and individuals are raising issues about errors in Electoral Rolls, including the Electoral Rolls prepared in the past,” the ECI said in a press release.

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“The appropriate time to raise any issue with the Electoral Rolls would have been during the Claims and Objections period of that phase, which is precisely the objective behind sharing the Electoral Rolls with all Political Parties and the Candidates. Had these issues been raised at the right time through the right channels, it would have enabled the concerned SDM / EROs to correct the mistakes, if genuine, before those elections,” it added.

According to the poll body, after the publication of draft electoral rolls, digital and physical copies are provided to all political parties and uploaded on its website. Electors and parties are then given a full month to file claims and objections before the final list is published. After finalisation, the rolls are again shared with all recognised parties and published online.

Emphasising that “utmost transparency remains as the hallmark of electoral roll preparation,” the ECI noted that some political parties and their booth level agents failed to examine the rolls in time or flag errors. “ECI continues to welcome the scrutiny of Electoral Rolls by Political Parties and any Elector. It will help SDMs/EROs to remove the errors and purify the Electoral Roll which has always been the objective of ECI,” the statement said.

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The remarks come amid repeated accusations from the Opposition, particularly Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who has alleged “vote theft” in Maharashtra, Karnataka and Haryana. On August 7, Gandhi claimed that in Karnataka’s Mahadevapura constituency alone, 100,250 votes were “stolen” through duplicate entries, fake addresses and bulk registrations at single locations.

“This is Election Commission data… You know that we know that you have done this across the country,” Gandhi alleged. The commission has since asked him to submit names of those allegedly added or removed wrongfully, along with a signed declaration.