Kamal Haasan Demands Machine-Readable Electoral Rolls, Slams Rahul Gandhi's Detention
Actor-turned-politician Kamal Haasan launched a sharp attack on the Election Commission of India (ECI) today, raising what he called "grave questions" about the integrity of the country's electoral rolls. In a strongly worded letter to the people of India, the Makkal Needhi Maiam (MNM) founder asked why the ECI refused to publish rolls in machine-readable formats that allow independent verification and why it demanded a written oath from Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi when the evidence he cited came from the poll body's records itself.
The Rajya Sabha MP's statement comes amid the ongoing controversy about bogus voters in the Mahadevapura assembly segment in Karnataka.
Last week, Rahul Gandhi alleged the assembly segment of the Bangalore Central Parliamentary Constituency had more than 1,00,000 fake votes in the 2024 Lok Sabha polls. Mr Gandhi accused the BJP of benefiting from duplicate entries, fake and invalid addresses, bulk voters at single addresses, invalid photos, and misuse of Form 6 - allegations the BJP has dismissed as baseless and politically motivated.
The ECI's insistence on complaints under oath and its reluctance to probe the issue have drawn criticism from legal experts and opposition leaders, who warn the episode has caused a major dent in the poll body's credibility.
Citing suspicious additions to rolls in Karnataka and Maharashtra and mass deletions in Bihar's Special Intensive Revision exercise, Mr Haasan questioned whether "addition sometimes resembles subtraction."
He demanded that the ECI rise to the standards set by former Chief Election Commissioner TN Seshan, "who was impartial, fearless and above partisan politics," and permit independent audits so that "people see the truth rather than be told to take comfort in authority's word."
Mr Haasan also condemned the detention of Rahul Gandhi and other INDIA bloc MPs while they were marching from Parliament to the ECI headquarters in Delhi to demand answers on alleged voter roll manipulation. "Detaining the people's elected voices for peacefully demanding answers for the people's rights is an assault on democracy itself. To arrest people's representatives for seeking transparency is to arrest democracy," Haasan wrote, warning that such actions "cannot stand in a free republic."
Framing the issue as a national cause beyond party lines, Mr Haasan urged all political parties, including those in the NDA, to unite for transparency. "Defend the vote, and you defend the republic," he said, calling on citizens to take the demand for reform "from village to town, from town to city, to every corner of India."
BJP spokesperson Sudhanshu Trivedi dismissed Mr Gandhi's claims as baseless and accused him of demeaning constitutional institutions.
With many independent agencies exposing large-scale irregularities, building on the issue raised by Rahul Gandhi, the issue has turned into a huge embarrassment for the poll panel.
Try Our AI Features
Explore what Daily8 AI can do for you:
Comments
No comments yet...
Related Articles
Indian Express
11 minutes ago
- Indian Express
Rahul alleges malpractice in voting: Maharashtra Cong to ‘reach out to every household to apprise people of wrongdoings'
Intensifying the nationwide protest against the alleged malpractices in election process launched by party leader Rahul Gandhi, the state Congress on Tuesday said it would appraise people in the state of the 'wrongdoings by reaching out to every household'. 'Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi has proved the wrongdoings in the election process of the country. The Election Commission (EC), instead of responding to the queries raised, has served notice to him. The state Congress will further intensify the protest in Maharashtra,' said Congress leader Ramesh Chennithala, in-charge of party affairs in Maharashtra. He said the BJP and the Union government under Prime Minister Narendra Modi are finishing democracy. 'Free and fair elections are becoming impossible in the country. We had raised it in the Maharashtra Assembly election when we noticed a big change in voters' choice compared to three months prior to that during the Lok Sabha elections last year,' he added. 'The malpractices seen during the Maharashtra Assembly elections were also witnessed in the Haryana Assembly elections and now it is likely to be repeated in the Bihar elections,' he said. The EC does what the BJP-led Union government says and the BJP is busy defending the EC for the wrongdoings, said Chennithala. 'The state Congress will reach out to every household on the issue of malpractices in elections. We will do a signature campaign and tell the public about vote cheating,' he said. The Congress leader said the Mahayuti government is postponing local body elections deliberately so as to use funds of civic bodies to manage its finances as the government is facing a serious financial crisis due to its wrong schemes. The Congress has not taken any decision on a pre-poll alliance for the forthcoming civic polls, he said, adding the party leaders are still discussing it. Chennithala said the closeness of two cousins MNS chief Raj Thackeray and Shiv Sena (UBT) chief Uddhav Thackeray was not a cause of concern for the Congress. 'MNS is not in our alliance. We don't know anything about the MNS and Sena (UBT) alliance, so we cannot comment on it. We don't have any issues if cousins are coming close but the alliance of their parties will be a political issue. We will discuss if it actually happens,' he said. State Congress chief Harshvardhan Sapkal said BJP rule in the country is destroying democracy and the party has chalked out a six-month programme to protest against it. 'The BJP always talks of a Congress-free country but 40 per cent of its leaders are imported from the Congress,' he said.
The Hindu
11 minutes ago
- The Hindu
No government school has closed down in Kerala in nine years: Minister
Minister for General Education V. Sivankutty has denied that government schools in Kerala are closing down. Not a single government school in the State was closed in the past nine years, the Minister said in a Facebook post on Tuesday. Union government statistics that showed a decline in government schools were baseless and an attempt to discredit the State, Mr. Sivankutty alleged. Union Minister of State for Education Jayant Chaudhary, in reply to an unstarred question by K. Radhakrishnan, MP, in the Lok Sabha on closure of government schools across the country, had submitted that 205 schools had closed down from 2019-20 to 2023-24 (201 from 2021-22). Referring to the numbers, Mr. Sivankutty said these were related to multi-grade learning centres (MGLCs), started as part of District Primary Education Programme (DPEP), a Centrally sponsored scheme, in the early 1990s. Once the Right to Education was passed, these could not continue as schools and were gradually phased out. Facilities, including free transport, had been arranged for the MGLC students to shift to nearby schools. As per the figures presented in the Lok Sabha, there were 5,014 government schools in 2019-20. It rose to 5,020 in 2020-21, fell to 5010 a year later, and further declined to 4,811 in 2022-23 and 4,809 in 2023-24. the data were sourced from UDISE and UDISE+ databases on school education in the country. 'Not updated data' Officials say UDISE+ data is directly updated by schools and hence not properly validated by the General Education department. Sampoorna is the State's official school management portal for everything from student strength to textbooks distribution and scholarships, but the Union government does not use this data. It had been proposed sometime ago that data on the Sampoorna portal along with other parameter details be collected and submitted to the Union government. However, that did not happen. Moreover, the data on UDISE was not up to date, unlike in the State where it is updated on the sixth working day every year. The UDISE data quoted by the Union government was not updated for even the 2024-25 academic year, they point out. The MGLC were not really considered government schools, they point out. According to the Sametham portal maintained by the Kerala Infrastructure and Technology for Education, there are 5,813 government schools in the State.
Mint
12 minutes ago
- Mint
‘Most spoilt and privileged woman': Kangana Ranaut slams Jaya Bachchan for pushing man trying to take selfie
BJP MP Kangana Ranaut slammed Samajwadi Party MP Jaya Bachchan, known for her no-nonsense personality, for pushing a man trying to take a selfie with her at the Constitution Club in Delhi on Tuesday. Without mincing her words, Kangana called Jaya the 'most spoilt and privileged woman.' Sharing the viral video of the incident on her Instagram stories, the BJP MP claimed that people put up with her 'tantrums/nonsense behaviour just because she is Amitabh Bachchan Ji's wife.' Insulting both Jaya Bachchan and the Samajwadi Party, Kangana Ranaut said, 'That Samajwadi topi looks like a rooster comb, while she looks like a fighting cock!!' 'Such disgrace and shame,' she added. Kangana Ranaut's IG story In the viral video, Jaya Bachchan can be seen pushing the man away and saying, 'Kya kar rahe hai aap (What are you doing?) What is this?' In the video, Jaya's fellow parliamentarian and Shiv Sena (UBT) leader Priyanka Chaturvedi is also seen standing near her. When Jaya shoves the man, Priyanka turns to look around and then walks towards the Club. Earlier, Jaya Bachchan blasted people in public. During the special debate on Operation Sindoor in the Parliament, the Rajya Sabha MP slammed the members of the treasury bench for interrupting her and said, 'Either you speak or I will speak.' Priyanka Chaturvedi, who was sitting beside Bachchan in the Rajya Sabha, also received a minor scolding from the Samajwadi Party leader. When Bachchan asked the treasury bench not to interrupt her when she was speaking, Chaturvedi was seen gesturing with her right arm. This caused Bachchan to turn towards the Sena UBT MP and say, 'Priyanka, don't control me.' Also, in July-August 2024, Jaya Bachchan got infuriated in the Rajya Sabha when she was introduced as 'Jaya Amitabh Bachchan' by the Upper House chairperson Jagdeep Dhankhar. Expressing her strong disapproval of the way she was introduced, she said, 'I, Jaya Amitabh Bachchan, want to say this that I am an artist, and I understand body language and expressions. And sir, your tone is not acceptable. We are colleagues, sir. You may be sitting on the Chair...'
