Kolkata (West Bengal) [India], August 2 : Union Minister Rajiv Ranjan (Lalan) Singh on Saturday mocked Congress leader and Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi against targeting the Election Commission and claims of possessing "atom bomb" of proof regarding vote rigging.
"The country does not run according to Rahul Gandhi; the country runs on democracy, it runs on legal processes. A few days ago, Rahul Gandhi was roaming around with a copy of the Constitution, so is it written in the Constitution that a person who is not a citizen of this country will also be a voter of this country?" Ranjan Singh told ANI.
Earlier on Friday, Rahul Gandhi had levelled serious allegations against the Election Commission of India (ECI), accusing it of direct involvement in large-scale voter fraud, with the Congress having "open-and-shut proof" of the alleged theft.
Gandhi said that the findings of an investigation by the Congress amount to nothing short of an "atom bomb" with implications severe enough to shake the very foundations of the ECI.
"We had a suspicion of voter theft, and we got into its granularity. Since the Election Commision was not helpful in the investigation, we did our own. It took six months, and the things we found are an 'Atom Bomb' and when this atom bomb explodes, you won't see the Election Commission in the country," he added.
Rajiv Ranjan (Lalan) Singh also hit out at the Leader of Opposition in the Bihar Assembly, Tejashwi Yadav, over his allegation that his name was missing from the voter list and said that he had no concern for facts.
He further said, "Tejashwi Yadav engages in such politics; he has no concern for facts. He does politics without facts; when the Election Commission has already clarified, what need is there for anyone's explanation?"
Tejashwi Yadav, on Saturday, alleged that his name was missing from the voter list amid the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise in Bihar. However, the Election Commission of India (ECI) has refuted his claim.
"My name is not there in the electoral roll. How will I contest the elections?" Tejashwi Yadav asked after he was unable to fetch his name using his Elector's Photo Identity Card (EPIC) number.
ECI clarified that Tejashwi's name is included in the draft voter list at serial number 416.
"It has come to our attention that Tejashwi Yadav has made a mischievous claim that his name does not appear in the draft electoral roll. His name is listed at Serial Number 416 in the Draft Electoral Roll. Therefore, any claim stating that his name is not included in the draft electoral roll is false and factually incorrect," the poll body said.