In a protest against opposition parties’ demands for the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral lists, Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge on Wednesday announced a march on the Election Commission (EC) on October 6 by members of his party in the “INDIA” bloc.
This decision was made during a meeting of the leaders of INDIA bloc. The opposition will stage protests against the district magistrates’ offices from October 2 to 8 and hold five rallies around the country in October and November, Kharge added. There is an intention to have a bigger gathering in Delhi on November 1.
The announcements follow an Indian Express report of allegations by its reporters that Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi had lodged public objections on at least 14 occasions more than 10 months to questions they raised on the Election Commission’s (EC) decisions and processes related to the implementation of the SIR exercise. The issues reported were related to change in Form 6, Deletion and Restoration of voters’ list and centralisation of electoral-roll data on ECINet Media Platform.
The INDIA bloc will meet President Droupadi Murmu in the second week of October to discuss its apprehensions about the working of electoral institutions, Kharge said. He further stated that opposition leaders will petition the Supreme Court for haste in the pending cases with respect to SIR and alleged electoral irregularities.
In accusing the opposition to going against the voters, the opposition has been using the word “vote chori”, suggesting that electoral list tampering could impact their electoral rights. These are accusations that are still under dispute in politics.
The Election Commission has been defending its practice. However, after reports of disagreements within, the poll panel has come up with some administrative recommendations, such as on the conduct of its meetings and electoral-roll related activities.
This dispute between the two sides is bound to be ongoing till October, with events and legal proceedings being planned by the INDIA bloc around the SIR process.