BJP, Election Commission working together to manipulate polls: Akhilesh Yadav

Lucknow: The BJP hides behind the Election Commission when it appears to be weakening, Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav said on Thursday while accusing the two of working together to manipulate electoral rolls and "deceiving India's democracy, Constitution and citizens".

The BJP and the Election Commission, with the administration's support, were preparing to manipulate elections on a large scale, Yadav told reporters at a press conference at the party headquarters.

"Where the BJP is certain to lose, that is where the biggest electoral theft takes place," he said and alleged that irregularities were more pronounced in constituencies where the BJP feared defeat.

Yadav cited the results of the Moradabad Nagar assembly constituency to buttress his point, saying the SP had lost the 2022 Assembly election there by just 782 votes and claiming that 8,000 to 10,000 fake voter entries had subsequently been added in the constituency.

"When the BJP is losing among the people and appears to be weakening, it hides behind the Election Commission. Both are deceiving India's democracy, Constitution and citizens," he said.

The SP, he added, had been raising these allegations since 2022.

Yadav also listed what he called the BJP's "10 election tactics", including fake voters, deleting genuine votes of opponents, distributing money and food before polling, intimidating voters, manipulating electronic voting machines (EVMs) and rigging vote counting.

He also accused the BJP of declaring losing candidates victorious, issuing them victory certificates, engineering splits within the opposition after elections and engineering splits by legislators breaking away from rival parties to form governments.

Yadav said his party's PDA (backward, Dalit, minorities) Praharis were checking electoral rolls across districts and assembly constituencies. He claimed they had identified 19.2 lakh purported fake voter entries.

Referring to Form 6 applications for new voter registration, Yadav said 87.66 lakh applications had been received and 84.30 lakh names added to the final electoral rolls.

However, he alleged that the Election Commission had made details of only 71.38 lakh applications public, leaving information on 16.18 lakh applications undisclosed.

The SP chief claimed that his party workers had identified another three lakh suspected fake voter entries apart from the 16.18 lakh cases. He alleged that some entries had identical names for voters and their parents.

Citing figures compiled by the party, Yadav said over 10,000 to 15,000 suspected fake voters have been added in several constituencies in UP.

Yadav displayed what he described as voter records containing multiple entries in the names of individuals. He claimed that one person had 10 voter entries and another, Shambhu Shankar Sharma, had four.

"One person has 10 votes. He will cast one vote himself. Who will cast the remaining nine?" he asked, alleging that such entries could be misused to influence election results.

He said the party had submitted complaints concerning alleged duplicate voter entries. He also urged people to verify the records using Electors Photo Identity Card (EPIC) numbers.

Questioning the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise, Yadav claimed it had taken 166 days and cost crores of rupees. He also alleged that more than 29 booth level officers (BLOs) had died during the exercise and questioned reports that it had been rendered ineffective.

Yadav further alleged that no members of the PDA communities had been appointed as Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) at the assembly constituency level. He challenged the Election Commission to disprove his claim.