Photo: Fotokannan at Malayalam Wikipedia / Wikimedia Commons, CC BY-SA 3.0
The opposition INDIA bloc will hold a protest march in Delhi on Monday, October 12, against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over its allegations of large-scale “vote chori”, while a delegation of senior leaders will hand a memorandum to Chief Justice of India Surya Kant seeking his intervention, Congress general secretary (organisation) K C Venugopal announced on Saturday. The ruling BJP hit back hard, accusing the opposition and the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) of trying to destabilise the country at the behest of foreign powers.
‘Gyanesh must go’
In a post on X, Venugopal appealed to “every Indian concerned about the survival of democracy” to join what he called a massive march. He said opposition MPs, leaders, workers and citizens would take part after a preparatory meeting of alliance leaders on Friday.
Gyanesh must go. There will be no backing down.
K C Venugopal, Congress general secretary
Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi said the Congress, the wider INDIA bloc and young people would take to the streets again on Monday, and that opposition leaders would go to the Supreme Court to meet the Chief Justice because they wanted to use every option available.
What the opposition is demanding
The march follows a meeting on Friday between a 10-member INDIA bloc delegation and President Droupadi Murmu at Rashtrapati Bhavan. In their memorandum to the President, the parties demanded:
- the resignation of the Chief Election Commissioner
- a return to ballot papers
- repeal of a provision in the 2023 law that, they say, gives the CEC and election commissioners lifelong immunity
- immediate suspension of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and restoration of 13.30 crore voters they say were illegally deleted
- annulment of Assembly elections held in the past two years wherever, they say, conclusive evidence of vote theft has been presented
BJP: ‘two anarchist groups’
BJP president Nitin Nabin described the INDIA bloc led by Rahul Gandhi and the CJP, which he called an ally of Arvind Kejriwal, as “two anarchist groups” competing to create instability. He alleged they were acting for political ends and “at the behest of foreign powers”, and warned that the government would deal firmly with attempts to create disturbance.
Former Union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad called the CJP an AAP proxy, accused the opposition of “weaponising street protests” after electoral defeats, and said the country would be governed through Parliament, not the streets. He defended the SIR as a legally mandated exercise to remove dead, duplicate and ineligible voters. Union minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan called the protests a conspiracy to trigger anarchy.
Opposition leaders rejected the charges. Rahul Gandhi told protesting students he was proud of them and urged them to keep protesting, while Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav said “the nation will unite in Delhi”. Left leaders condemned what they called widespread repression of peaceful protesters.
What happens next
The announcement comes after thousands of people were detained in Delhi during the CJP’s protest on Saturday, and as the group has called fresh demonstrations. With the opposition’s march and its approach to the Chief Justice both due on Monday, the dispute over the electoral rolls and the Chief Election Commissioner is set to stay at the centre of national politics this week.
