Election Commission again asks Rahul Gandhi for proof of vote theft, says there is still time

The Election Commission on Monday said that Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha and Congress leader Rahul Gandhi still has time to submit a formal declaration to prove his allegation of vote theft or apologise to the nation. Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer asked Congress MP Rahul Gandhi to submit documents for investigation into his “vote theft” allegations against the Election Commission of India. In a letter dated August 10, Karnataka Chief Electoral Officer said that Rahul Gandhi has claimed that he has documents from the records of the Election Commission of India during his August 7 press conference alleging that a voter Shakun Rani voted twice based on the data shown by a polling officer. The poll body further said that in preliminary investigation, Shakun Rani has denied voting twice. The CEO office also found that the tick-marked document submitted by Rahul Gandhi was not issued by a polling officer, raising questions about the authenticity of the claim. The Karnataka CEO requested Rahul Gandhi to provide relevant documents based on his allegation so that a detailed investigation can be conducted by Karnataka election officials. The Chief Electoral Officer of Haryana has also sent a reminder to Rahul Gandhi asking him to declare under oath that vote theft had taken place. On August 7, Rahul Gandhi held a press conference citing internal analysis. The Leader of Opposition said that the Congress expected to win 16 Lok Sabha seats in Karnataka, but it got only nine seats. He said that the Congress investigated seven unexpected defeats, and focused on Mahadevapura, where he alleged vote theft of 1,00,250 votes. Presenting the Congress’ research on voting in Mahadevapura assembly constituency of Karnataka, Rahul Gandhi alleged “vote theft” of 1,00,250 votes. He said that we found 1,00,250 votes stolen in five different ways. Duplicate voters, fake and invalid addresses, and a large number of voters at the same address, in a building where 50-60 people live. But when we went there, there was no record of the people living there. A family lived in that house.