Bhubaneshwar (Odisha) [India], August 9 : Congress leader Srikant Jena on Saturday backed Rahul Gandhi's "vote theft" allegations against the Election Commission, and said "vote manipulation" has been proved by the Leader of Opposition.
His remarks came in response to a press conference held by Rahul Gandhi on August 7, where he claimed that the 2024 Lok Sabha elections were "choreographed" by the EC to benefit the BJP, which he said appeared "immune to anti-incumbency."
Speaking to ANI, Jena said, "Vote manipulation and vote theft have been proved by Rahul Gandhi through his press conference, after a six-month survey of a particular constituency assembly segment in Karnataka...So far as Odisha is concerned, the BJP and BJD had an understanding pre-election, everybody knew it...We would have also gone up to 35 to 40 Vidhan Sabha seats. That is our internal assessment. And we would have won 4-5 Lok Sabha seats also. Anyway, this is a theft. This is an attack on the Constitution. And the EC is squarely responsible..."
Earlier today, the Bharatiya Janata Party asked the Leader of Opposition in the Lok Sabha, Rahul Gandhi, to give a formal complaint regarding his "vote theft" allegation against the Election Commission of India (EC). The party's National Spokesperson Gaurav Bhatia also alleged that the Congress has a habit of blaming someone for their electoral setbacks.
On Friday, the Centre and opposition sparred over Rahul Gandhi's allegations of "vote theft" with BJP leaders and allies dismissing his claims as "baseless."
However, the opposition members backed his charges and demanded a parliamentary discussion.
Union Minister Gajendra Singh Shekhawat said neither Rahul Gandhi's party nor his party workers believed his claims, adding that if common entries in voter lists existed, a Special Intensive Revision (SIR) was necessary.
Meanwhile, labelling Rahul Gandhi's claims as 'baseless", the EC on Friday said that the Leader of Opposition (LoP) in Lok Sabha is trying to "sensationalise" the issue instead of availing the legal processes.
The poll body in a statement said that Rahul Gandhi repeated a "tired" script."
At his recent press conference, Rahul Gandhi repeated a tired script. In 2018, it was then Kamal Nath, the then President of MPCC; today, it's the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha playing the same tune. In 2018, they tried to mislead the Supreme Court by producing documents from a private website to demonstrate that there are mistakes in the electoral rolls in as much as the same face was shown again for as many as 36 voters. Wherein, in reality, the defects were rectified around 4 months ago and the copy of the same was supplied to the party. This was made ground to seek the searchable pdf format for electoral rolls. The Court refused to accept the prayer of Kamal Nath," ECI said.