'Vote-choro ki raksha kar rahe hain': Rahul Gandhi's all-out attack on CEC Gyanesh Kumar

Rahul Gandhi, Congress MP from Wayanad and Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, on Thursday launched an all-out attack against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar. In his press conference, the LoP accused Kumar of protecting those who stole votes in different states. 

He alleged that Kumar is defending "murderers of democracy" by not giving details of mass voter deletions in Karnataka, Maharashtra, Haryana and Uttar Pradesh. 

" 'Gyanesh Kumar ji vote-choro ki raksha kar rahe hai. This is black and white evidence; there is no confusion in this. The question is, who is deleting votes across different states through call centres and software? The Election Commission knows it, Gyanesh Kumar knows it," Gandhi said. 

He further explained that his accusation about Gyanesh Kumar came from the Karnataka CID's ongoing investigation into alleged vote theft. Rahul Gandhi said that the Election Commission is not providing this information despite the Karnataka CID reaching out to them repeatedly. 

He said that the FIR was filed in February 2023, following which the Karnataka CID wrote to EC seeking details of the numbers and transactions in March.

The EC replied in August 2023, but neither did it fulfill any of the demands nor did it furnish information, as per Gandhi. He added that by September 2025, the Karnataka CID has written 18 times to the EC.

"The CID of Karnataka has sent 18 letters in 18 months to the Election Commission, and they have asked the Election Commission for some very simple facts," the Gandhi scion claimed. 

The information sought by Karnataka CID included the destination IP from where the voter forms were filed, the device destination ports from where the applications were filed, and the OTP trails. "Why are they not giving it? Because this will lead us to where the operation is being done, and we are absolutely convinced where this is going to go."

He said that the EC's reluctance to provide information to Karnataka CID despite repeated appeals is "absolute solid proof" that Gyanesh Kumar is protecting people involved in vote theft. "This is also absolute solid proof that this is being done in a centralised way, this is being done at scale and this is being done using large resources."