India News | Sapkal Accuses Fadnavis of Electoral Fraud, Demands Resignation
Get latest articles and stories on India at LatestLY. Maharashtra Congress president Harshwardhan Sapkal on Tuesday demanded the resignation of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, saying the 8 per cent rise in voters in five months in his Nagpur South West constituency was "electoral fraud".
Mumbai, June 24 (PTI) Maharashtra Congress president Harshwardhan Sapkal on Tuesday demanded the resignation of Chief Minister Devendra Fadnavis, saying the 8 per cent rise in voters in five months in his Nagpur South West constituency was "electoral fraud".
Sapkal alleged that evidence continues to emerge daily suggesting that the BJP-led Mahayuti alliance came to power in Maharashtra by manipulating votes during the 2024 state assembly elections.
Earlier in the day, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, in a post on X, alleged irregularities in the state assembly polls, claiming that there weren't isolated glitches but "vote theft", while Fadnavis countered his claim, pointing out that more than 25 constituencies in Maharashtra saw more than 8 per cent increase in voter numbers between the Lok Sabha and assembly elections.
Rahul Gandhi shared a media report that claimed that between the 2024 Lok Sabha elections and the Maharashtra assembly polls, Fadnavis's constituency, Nagpur South West, added 29,219 new voters.
Sapkal said, "Rahul Gandhi has consistently raised the issue of electoral fraud. After the irregularities in BJP state president Chandrashekhar Bawankule's Kamthi constituency were exposed, it has now come to light that in Chief Minister Fadnavis' Nagpur South constituency, the voter count has increased by 8 percent in just five months."
He charged that Fadnavis must take moral responsibility and resign, as the BJP's "vote rigging" has been exposed.
The Congress leader, in a statement, reiterated Gandhi's claims that the voter list in the chief minister's constituency saw an 8 per cent rise in just five months, with certain booths witnessing a 20 to 50 per cent surge, while booth-level officers (BLOs) have reported that unknown individuals cast votes.
This is a case of vote rigging, which is why the Congress has demanded the immediate release of a machine-readable digital voter list and the CCTV footage, he said.
"The key question remains: how did the BJP alliance, which faced a humiliating defeat in the Lok Sabha elections, secure a massive win in the assembly polls just five months later? During this period, the BJP, with the help of the Election Commission, manipulated the voter rolls and increased the vote count. There was an 8 per cent discrepancy between the votes recorded after 5 PM and the final figures announced the next day," Sapkal alleged.
He further claimed that the Election Commission has not provided a satisfactory explanation for this anomaly and has instead introduced rules limiting access to information and even decided to delete all CCTV footage after 45 days.
(The above story is verified and authored by Press Trust of India (PTI) staff. PTI, India’s premier news agency, employs more than 400 journalists and 500 stringers to cover almost every district and small town in India.. The views appearing in the above post do not reflect the opinions of LatestLY)