Congress Raises Concerns with Election Commission Over Voter Data Discrepancies in Maharashtra Assembly Polls

PTI, New Delhi, 29.11.24 :  The Congress on Friday raised with the Election Commission "serious and grave inconsistencies" which it said were being revealed in the data relating to the polling and counting processes for the recently-concluded Maharashtra Assembly polls and sought an in-person hearing to present relevant evidence.

In a memorandum to the poll panel, AICC Maharashtra in-charge Ramesh Chennithala, Maharashtra Congress chief Nana Patole and AICC general secretary Mukul Wasnik said "these glaring inconsistencies" which strike at the very root of a transparent, free and fair electoral system are not based on any biased motives or far-fetched presumptions but have been extracted from the information made publicly available by the Commission.

Sharing the memorandum on X, Congress general secretary in-charge communications Jairam Ramesh said the leaders have raised serious issues which are being discussed in the public domain.

They have asked the Election Commission (EC) for an in-person hearing to present the relevant evidence and raise constituency-wise issues as well, he said.

In their memorandum, the Congress leaders said, "In fact, questions relating to Maharashtra’s voter data have also been raised by a former Chief Election Commissioner, hence we are bringing the same to the attention of this Commission." They flagged two issues of arbitrary deletion of voters and subsequent addition of over 10,000 voters in each constituency from the final voter lists as well as inexplicable increase in voting percentages from 5 pm to the final voter percentage declared by the Commission at 11:30 pm on the day of polling on November 20.

"In the days leading up to the polling day, the Indian National Congress (INC) and its allies received several on-ground-level reports about different means being adopted by the ruling regime to commit large scale electoral fraud across the Assembly Constituencies in Maharashtra," the memorandum said.

The Congress leaders said these included instances of arbitrary deletion of voters from the voter list and consequent insertion of roughly 10,000 voters per constituency across Maharashtra.

"With this exercise of unchecked and arbitrary deletion and consequent insertion of voters, the state of Maharashtra witnessed an unprecedented increase of an estimated 47 lakh voters being added to the electoral roll from between July 2024 -- November 2024," the memorandum said.

It is significant to note that out of the 50 Assembly constituencies where there was an average increase of 50,000 voters, the ruling regime and its allies secured victory from 47 of these constituencies, the leaders argued.

"These data points on a prima facie reading, demonstrate that -- there has been a significant and inexplicable increase in the number of registered voters across the state of Maharashtra; and there has been an exercise of deletion and addition of names in voters lists; all of which have conveniently worked to the advantage of the incumbent government," the memorandum said.

This issue was duly raised by the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) alliance on October 19 before this Commission, he said.

"However, no cogent action was taken by this Commission on the Representation dated 19.10.2024 submitted by the MVA Alliance in this regard," the memorandum said.

They urged the Commission to immediately undertake a thorough investigation and prepare a detailed report on the addition and deletion of voters in Maharashtra.

Elaborating on the other issue, the Congress leaders said several glaring discrepancies have been reported in the voter turnout data for the Maharashtra Assembly elections.

Pointing out that as per the data made available by this Commission, the polling percentage across the state of Maharashtra at 5 pm was 58.22%, they said the percentage was later reported to be 65.02% as of 11:30 pm on the same day.