New Delhi: Amid widespread controversy over the discrepancies in the Election Commission’s ‘flawed and partisan’ Special Intensive Revision (SIR) and Opposition’s clamour for action, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) Sunday issued a detailed rebuttal of charges while accusing Congress, the principal opposition party, of resorting to ‘fearmongering’.
BJP General Secretary Vinod Tawde shared an ‘explainer’ video on his X account, to counter and debunk the litany of charges against the Election Commission (EC) and also reject accusations of ruling BJP’s involvement in the whole episode.
The ‘explainer’ video addresses slew of issues ranging from 13 crore voter deletions, purported changes in Form-6, alteration in ECINET format, among many others.
“The 13 crore names were not deleted — they were flagged for verification in categories such as deceased, absent, transferred, or duplicate. The final action takes place after the processing of claims, objections, and appeals,” BJP leader Tawde said, recently appointed as the party’s Uttar Pradesh In-charge.
Giving break-up of the proposed deletions in draft electoral rolls, it explains that about 2.6 crore voters were recorded dead, three crore absent at given address, 6.3 crore permanently shifted to different locations and one crore duplicate voters were registered.
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It also adds that the detailed information was shared with about 20 lakh booth level agents of all parties.
“No changes were made to alter Form-6. All three Election Commissioners were in consonance on the additional details added with the Form-6 and it had the approval of Supreme Court,” it claims.
The ‘explainer’ video also rejects claims of centralisation, saying that there was no structural change in the framework and the local EC staff, including Electoral Registration Officers (EROs) were fully equipped to handle voters’ request at local level.
The BJP leader accused the Congress of indulging in fearmongering, in a bid to conceal the facts and also urged people to follow the facts rather than getting swayed by Opposition’s ‘lies and fakery’.
Saying that SIR’s objective is to include every voter and not disenfranchise anyone, it informs that 2.3 crore new Gen-Z voters have been added so far since the SIR drive started last year and today, the total strength of Gen-Z voters stands at 17.3 crore.
Dismissing the ‘vote chori’ allegations as means to befool and mislead the electorate, it says the poll panel always acted within the statutory powers and the SIR drive in all states that went to polls (Bihar and West Bengal) were duly upheld by the apex court.
