2025 Indian electoral controversy

The ECI dismissed the claims and urged him to submit them through a signed declaration. On 17 August, Gyanesh Kumar, the chief election commissioner, added that the allegations must be filed under oath within seven days, failing which they would be deemed “baseless and invalid," citing Rule 20(3)(B) of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960 and no such affidavit was ever filed by Rahul Gandhi or Indian National Congress.

Since then, the opposition parties led by the INC have organised protests and social media campaigns over the ECI's revision of Bihar's electoral rolls. In reaction to the allegation, several members and affiliates of the BJP have defended the commission, while counter accusing the opposition parties of having indulged in electoral fraud themselves.

Background

Democratic backsliding under BJP rule since 2014

Since the victory of Narendra Modi, leading the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP), in the 2014 Indian general election, India has witnessed significant democratic backsliding.

Laws on sedition, defamation, and counterterrorism have been regularly employed to crack down on critics and dissenting voices, including the detention and arrest of opposition leaders. The government has moved to further stifle critics in academia and the press, leading to the rise of an increasingly right-wing and pro-government mainstream media. The country's referee institutions, such as the judiciary, investigative agencies, the Election Commission of India (ECI), Lokpal, among others have been weakened through coercion, patronage, and ideological alignment with the BJP, leading to an erosion of public trust in institutions.

In 2021, the V-Dem Institute downgraded India from 'flawed democracy' to 'electoral autocracy'. In 2021, Freedom House downgraded India from "free" to "partly free," a title the country has since held for three consecutive years since.

Change in the appointment process of election commissioners

Election commissioners are members of the ECI, appointed by the president of India on the recommendation of a three-member panel, named the Selection Committee, through a majority vote. Prior to 2023, the committee consisted of the prime minister of India, the chief justice of India, and the leader of the opposition in the Lok Sabha. However, the Chief Election Commissioner and other Election Commissioners (Appointment, Conditions of Service and Term of Office) Act of 2023 controversially replaced the chief justice with a union minister, thereby giving the ruling government a dominant role in the appointment of election commissioners.

Past allegation of electoral fraud

Earlier, the opposition Indian National Congress (INC; commonly known simply as "the Congress") had accused the ECI of collusion with the ruling BJP, and of rigging the assembly elections in Madhya Pradesh and Maharashtra.

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Allegation

On 1 August 2025, Rahul Gandhi, the leader of opposition in Lok Sabha, alleged electoral fraud during the 2024 Indian general election. He referred to the evidence as an "atom bomb" and stated that the ruling party will have "no place to hide." On 6 August, the opposition demanded a discussion on the special exercise carried out by the ECI for the revision of electoral rolls in Bihar. Arjun Ram Meghwal, the law minister, asked Rahul Gandhi to present the evidences regarding the fraud and stated that the functioning of the election commission cannot be debated in parliament, citing a previous precedence by Lok Sabha speaker Balram Jakhar.

On 7 August, Rahul Gandhi, in a meeting of the press, alleged that the election commission added fraudulent voters to the electoral roll in the Mahadevapura Assembly constituency in Karnataka, and accused the commission of rigging the 2024 Lok Sabha elections. The Congress lost the election to the Bangalore Central Lok Sabha constituency, of which the assembly segment was part of, by 114,000 votes despite leading in the remaining six assembly segments of the constituency. He stated that the evidences were a result of a six month long research conducted by the party, and challenged the election commission to publish an electronic voter list and CCTV footage to debunk his claims.

On 5 November, 2025 Rahul Gandhi alleged vote fraud in the 2024 Haryana Legislative Assembly election. He claimed theft of over 25 lakh votes in Haryana. He presented evidence including repeated use of the same photographic images in voter rolls and cited the case of a Brazilian model's image, which appeared on multiple voter IDs across Haryana.

Response from the ECI

The election commission dismissed the allegations as "baseless," and reverted that the Congress did not file any appeal or concern regarding the electoral rolls prior to the elections. It urged Rahul Gandhi to submit a written declaration with the allegations as per the rule 20(3)(B) of the Registration of Electors Rules, 1960. The commission also reverted to the allegation of a particular voter Shakuni Rani voting twice, and said that a preliminary enquiry conducted by the office confirmed that she only voted once. It further stated that the request for a machine readable voter list was rejected by the Supreme Court in 2019, and that reviewing the CCTV footage for the 100,000 voting booths is "implausible," claiming that the footage is retained only if any losing candidate files an election petition to challenge the election in the concerned High Court within 45 days of the election.

The chief electoral officers of Maharashtra and Haryana issued notices to Rahul Gandhi for submitting a formal declaration under 10 days for his alleged accusation of inclusion and exclusion of non-eligible and eligible voters by the election commission in the respective states. On 17 August, chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar responded to the claims of Rahul Gandhi stating that if the claims are not made under a declaration under oath within seven days, it would be considered as "baseless and invalid." He further stated that if Rahul Gandhi is not willing to submit a signed affidavit, he should then "apologise for his allegations."

Protests and reactions

On 11 August, about 200 lawmakers and their supporters held a protest against the special intensive revision exercise of the electoral rolls carried out in Bihar. They marched to the office of the election commission office in New Delhi, and claimed that it is a government conspiracy for "vote theft" which will lead to disenfranchisement. The Delhi Police detained multiple protesters including Rahul Gandhi. Protests were also held by the opposition in West Bengal. Bharat Rashtra Samithi chairman K. T. Rama Rao accused the Congress of vote theft in the 2023 Telangana state elections. Karnataka state minister K. N. Rajanna of the Congress condemned Rahul Gandhi's remarks on the election commission. He was removed from the cabinet for his remarks against his party leader, which sparked protests by his followers in Tumakuru district.

On 12 August, members of parliament from the Congress and other opposition parties protested the alleged electoral fraud by wearing t-shirts which bore the face of Minta Devi, a 124-year-old woman from the Daraunda Assembly constituency. In response, union minister Kiren Rijiju criticised the protesters for allegedly "mocking" Minta Devi and claiming her to be 124 years of age. Minta Devi, who was reportedly 35 years old, condemned the use of her picture in the protest without her permission. The district administration later stated that a clerical error was responsible for the incorrect age.

Anurag Thakur of the BJP called the allegations as an excuse for the defeat of congress in the elections and as a political agenda on the backdrop of the upcoming elections in Bihar. On 13 August, the BJP counter accused the opposition parties of electoral irregularities in various parliamentary seats such as Rae Bareli, Wayanad, Diamond Harbour, and Kannauj and demanded resignation of the respective opposition members Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Abhishek Banerjee, and Akhilesh Yadav representing those constituencies respectively. At a presentation held at the BJP headquarters in Delhi, the party alleged irregularities during the elections for the Kolathur assembly seat in Tamil Nadu represented by Tamil Nadu chief minister and Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam chief M. K. Stalin and in the Mainpuri parliamentary seat in Uttar Pradesh represented by Samajwadi party leader Dimple Yadav. It further accused the opposition leaders for rigging elections, and blamed the opposition of protecting their "vote bank" of illegal immigrants from Bangladesh.

On 13 August, Rahul Gandhi reportedly met with seven voters of Bihar whose names were allegedly removed from the electoral rolls declaring them as dead. On 14 August, he further declared that the opposition will set out a protest in all 30 districts of Bihar in three phases, beginning from 17 August, which was later postponed by a week. On 15 August, Congress launched "Vote chori se azaadi" campaign on their social media handles, and requested people to change their display pictures to support their protest against the election commission. On 18 August, it was reported in the media that the Indian National Developmental Inclusive Alliance was contemplating about moving an impeachment motion against the chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar.