- 5 minutes ago
A reported internal rift within the Election Commission of India has escalated into a major political confrontation and credibility crisis. An Indian Express investigation revealed that two election commissioners logged objections 14 times in 10 months regarding decisions tied to the Special Intensive Revision (SIR). In Goa, SIR software flagged voters with logical discrepancies; although Electoral Registration Officers verified 97 as eligible, the system lacked a rollback function to reverse earlier deletions before the roll was finalised.
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00:00You're watching To The Point and we continue with the verb of the Democratic Newsroom,
00:04focused on the Election Commission.
00:06What began as a reported rift within the poll panel has now snowballed into a clear political
00:11confrontation and a credibility crisis for the Election Commission of India.
00:16The India Bloc is preparing an impeachment motion against CEC Gyanesh Kumar.
00:21The CJP has now issued a 48-hour resignation ultimatum and the BJP has hit back.
00:29So what exactly is happening inside the Election Commission, we don't quite know,
00:34other than a single-page press release at the back of the Indian Express report yesterday.
00:44The Indian Express on Wednesday reported a rift inside the Election Commission.
00:49Two election commissioners had recorded objections 14 times in 10 months over decisions linked to SIR.
00:57The EC responded, saying differences in views are normal, internal checks and balances are part of process
01:04and all decisions were unanimous.
01:07But today, the Indian Express has detailed what happened in Goa.
01:12SIR software flagged several voters for logical discrepancies.
01:17The voters were asked to prove their eligibility.
01:20EROs heard their cases, checked their documents and found 97 of them to be eligible voters.
01:27But there was a problem.
01:28The software had no rollback option.
01:31The EROs could not reverse the earlier deletions.
01:34The Goa CEO office sought a rollback eight times.
01:37But the requests were not addressed before the deadline.
01:41Result?
01:4297 eligible voters were left off the final roll.
01:48India Today questioned Goa CEO Sanjay Goyal over the Rao.
01:52He refused to answer our questions.
02:16It was wrong to let you enter the cabin.
02:19You are acting too rigid, unnecessarily.
02:50The Indian bloc is preparing to move an impeachment motion against CEC Gyanesh Kumar.
02:57Rahul Gandhi has led the opposition charge, demanding action against the CEC.
03:03Mr. Gyanesh Kumar must resign immediately.
03:06You are a highly educated person, please understand what is going on here.
03:13This thing that you have done is an act against the Indian nation.
03:20We are not going to let democracy be destroyed in India and sit silent.
03:26We are not going to do it.
03:29The CJP has given Gyanesh Kumar 48 hours to resign, threatening nationwide protests.
03:34If within 24 hours, sorry, 48 hours, Gyanesh Kumar doesn't resign,
03:41the Kokuraj Janta Party will start nationwide agitation before we sit in Delhi
03:47and without Gyanesh Kumar's resignation, we will go back.
03:51The BJP has hit back.
03:53The other people who believed to be rejected in the gekommen to be kilobal of the wealthy voters,
04:00was olvides of their hearts being destroyed by theTP.
04:06This video was available in the public domain.
04:08We have four times voted for him in order to be standing.
04:10We are telling him to go back home and tell him his location.
04:14We are in this area.
04:15And later, if someone feels like this, the country is talking about it.
04:21this is no longer just about 14 objections it is about how election commission functions
04:28when its own commissioners disagree in the world's largest democracy trust in the poll body is trust
04:35in the vote itself and when that trust is questioned from within the credibility of the
04:41institution is at stake bureau report india today
04:48all right we are joining me right now is mr saeed zafar islam former rajya sabha
04:52mp of the bjp senior leader i also have mr vivek tanka rajya sabha mp congress and senior advocate
04:58also sorov das joins me from the kokro jantha party but uh beginning with uh dr saeed zafar islam
05:04dr islam you know we've seen every time a the story comes out from indian express the bjp comes
05:12out and starts to defend it you have rahu gandhi who does a press conference at the back of the
05:17indian express report now you have the bjp once again come out and defend the election commission
05:23why is the bjp behaving like the spokesperson of the ec sir well we are not the spokesperson of ec
05:31election commission will speak for themselves it's an independent body it's a constitutional body and
05:36they will speak for themselves but when the political parties are trying to spread false
05:43things to the public then i with and putting the government the dog putting the party in the dog
05:49then it is important for us to also speak the truth indian express what you are quoting indian
05:55report on indian express something which needs to be verified revalidated who has spoken to indian
06:02express did any of the election commissioner has spoken about it when the dissent was made
06:06i'm sure they must have deliberated the discuss they must have discussed everything about it
06:11and they may have different opinions that is something which is good as part of the democracy
06:15it's part of the democratic process but once the dissent is made mid and it's a consensus
06:20everybody has signed up they made the press conference together none of them said in the
06:24press conference that i i had but sir there has been no press conference they've only released the ec has
06:30only released a one statement which pretty much confirms the story no pretty i'm talking about
06:36the press conferences which was made earlier when the dissent was made not that today they
06:43only have given a press release and as and when it is warranted i'm sure they will come out and
06:49speak
06:49about them and they will expose every political party but sir you don't think it's warranted right
06:54now that the ec comes out and gives point by point rebuttal i i'm sure they will do it but
07:00as i said
07:00i'm not the spokesperson of ec but when allegation is made by principal opposition party when allegation
07:09is made with one of the political parties who has lost relevance from and connect with the public
07:16they are making because they have lost the election they are making this kind of a statement
07:19is something which is factually incorrect then we must defend it we must speak the truth about it
07:24today the press conference which was made by rahul gandhi he made certain statement which is
07:31factually incorrect and i had there been a statement of confirmation or the quote in the indian express
07:38news by a one of the election commissioner and had they said stated that yes we had dissented
07:44the president then i could have agreed to them but let me tell you a few things let me tell
07:48you a few
07:49things which is very important and i'm tankaji is there he is a legal luminary and i'm sure that he
07:55will
07:56he will agree with me that first of all it is a constitutional body they have no business to write
08:01to
08:01cabinet secretary they are not they don't work under the government they don't report to the government
08:06the only authority which they need to report to if there is anything they wanted to speak to there
08:11it is the president of india they should have spoken so which again if they as a as an election
08:17commissioner they know they draw comfort confidence and the constitutional power from the body
08:24and their constitutional authority then they must know what exactly they had to when they need to
08:29exercise it if they are writing to uh if they if at all they are writing if at all i
08:34don't know whether
08:34they have written or not if they are at all writing to cabinet securities is something they were aware
08:40that they need not dr i'm going to ask you one quick question before i let you go sir and
08:43that
08:44question is are you questioning the veracity of the indian express report are you rubbishing the report
08:49because point by point it has raised some very pertinent question that the ec needs to answer be it
08:55centralization of data be it the software glitches be it form six and also how dissent was noted
09:0314 times and three times where both the ecs came together on an issue yet they were kept in the
09:09dark
09:10no first of all how can you verify that all these claims made by somebody in indian express whoever
09:17written this report how can you verify who will revalidate it it's only the election commission or
09:23they must go to the court approach the court with all this if they have all the information but
09:27the fact is everyone knows that had there been dissent by two election commission no decision could
09:34have been made and it had it been communicated by the chief election commission then it is an illegal
09:39thing so you're questioning you're questioning the veracity of the reports absolutely it's actually
09:46incorrect it's misleading it is only with intention with the malafied intent to mislead the nation
09:53okay sir on that note thank you for joining us i want to cut across to mr vivek tanka before
09:57we go
09:58uh to mr soravdas uh vivek tanka ji your leader rahul gandhi held a press conference today uh
10:06reminiscent of press conferences he's held earlier on the election commission of india where he's asked
10:11for the resignation of mr gyanesh kumar now what is the tangible footprint that the congress is going
10:17to bring to this the press conference has come at the back of a damning report now what is it
10:23that
10:23your party is going to do are you going to get into a protest are you moving uh you know
10:28a no
10:29confidence an impeachment motion against a cec it's happened before it's been defeated what is the party
10:35going to do you know the uh the object the object the target would be we must get the resignation
10:45of the
10:45cec he has to get out of this place but to achieve that we need to have various uh tiers
10:54of action one
10:56of course has to be a public reaction and a public action policy where all uh political parties have to
11:04get together and in a very cohesive manner set up set up their case before the country and the country
11:11is
11:11listening this time you can see you can feel that judiciary also has to step in in the past
11:17judiciary did did take some action but that was not good enough it it it it left
11:25lacks of people uh outside the voter list in bengal also so judiciary has to step in in democracy has
11:32to
11:33survive in this country and thirdly parliament has to get active on this also so it had the footprints have
11:39to be in all in all at all tiers at all levels may be public meet political party meet judiciary
11:47meet
11:47parliament but mr tanka rahul gandhi has repeatedly said the recent elections that have been held under
11:57this election commission have been compromised in the next six months sir you have important big
12:02ticket elections coming up which are very important to your party as well you have a election where you
12:07are uh you know your party is going to is hoping to form government which is punjab then you have
12:12the biggest election of uttar pradesh where in all probability you and your ally samajwadi party will
12:18be fighting that election together if you have no faith how do you think you're going to go into that
12:22election or will you go into those elections at all no right now elections have not been declared
12:30uh i feel that a lot of good a lot of things are going to happen before such a notification
12:35actually
12:36takes place uh india is on the boil india will not tolerate an adulterated election india will not
12:44tolerate an election where results are unreal uh pretty let me tell you just one example i have fought
12:51elections myself and i've seen elections in my life you know in in in in our cities in madhya pradesh
12:58i can say
12:58we would know beforehand what would be the result but people would say falana aadmi jeetne wala hai
13:05and uh iski bhot achi position every panwala every chaiwala would tell you that what i found in the last
13:12two elections is in especially parliament also and then it would answer what you you think that somebody
13:17is going to win that's the public opinion and the result is to the contrary i've experienced it myself
13:24when the whole city was saying that mr tankha is going to win i mean this is not me even
13:30the bj
13:30people were saying that tankha sahib is going to win this time it looks that people want him to win
13:34this is 19 i'm talking of the result is i lose by a huge margin now i've never seen such
13:40results in my
13:41life that's a lazy argument just because people were saying i was going to win i was going to win
13:45and
13:45that's an argument that even rahul gandhi made where he's saying how can there be no anti-incumbency
13:50against this government you know away from that there are certain facts that at least the indian
13:54express report exposes what is the congress going to do on that we're going to keep a keen eye thank
13:59you mr vivek tankha for giving us the time and joining us now i want to just bring in uh
14:04sort of
14:04thus uh into this conversation sort of thus you and your colleagues with your pressure group cjp said that
14:1048 hours if the election commissioner cec chief election election commissioner mr gyanesh kumar does not
14:17resign you are going to sit in at a jantar mantra like protest what are the contours of this protest
14:25if he doesn't resign see the young generation is very creative you saw the kind of creative content
14:33and the methods that they use during the jantar mantra protests how it is going to pan out that
14:38time will tell but definitely there needs to be a larger uh discussion now about the state of affairs
14:45with our in the country and there definitely needs to be a pushback against such authoritarian tactics
14:52of you know disenfranchising people at such a mass level 13 crore people have been deleted
14:58because of the sir the special intensive revision by gyanesh kumar are going against the other two
15:04election commissioners despite the vote being one is to two gyanesh kumar was prevailing so who
15:09ordered him to do all of this because it can't just be gyanesh kumapriti it has to be someone in
15:14the
15:14government a higher up person sort of you know you and your group have built a certain amount of
15:21capital and credibility uh where your pressure group extracted the resignation of the then education
15:27minister do you think sticking your neck out on this issue getting into protest mode you will be able
15:33to attract the similar kind of crowds that you attracted in jantar mantra do you think people will
15:38come out gen z will come out in droves to support you do you think it could also be a
15:42credibility crisis
15:46for you no i don't think there's a question of credibility here the the only question of
15:50credibility here is of the election commission of india and why are we getting into this matter
15:55prithi it's not a political issue political parties issue per se it is about the young generation the
16:01gen z's who are being stopped from being voters since 2024 prithi we can go doing our school
16:08thikaro fix the schools fix adivasi schools listening tools fix the hospitals we can do all of that but
16:14none of that is going to matter if people are unable to vote all right sorry thank you there for
16:20joining
16:20us a 48 hour ultimatum is what the pressure group kokro janta party has issued if that doesn't happen
16:27they are getting into protest mode like jantar mantra but sort of not really confirming what will the
16:33contours look like with that i'm going to quickly shift focus to the other developing story and this
16:37comes in just days after the jammui horror well another shocker same state uh of bihar another very
16:45disturbing video has come in from samastipur a minor girl allegedly surrounded dragged and harassed by a
16:51mob in broad daylight four accused have now been arrested here's the full report
17:04india was still reeling from the jammui horror now comes another shocker from bihar
17:11this time in samastipur
17:14a minor girl surrounded by a mob dragged roped and harassed in broad daylight
17:26the shocking video shows her desperately resisting as men grab her and refuse to let her go
17:35four accused have been arrested
17:38yeah yeah
17:39yeah
17:40yeah
17:40okay
17:40yeah
17:41yeah
17:44yeah
17:45yeah
18:03And this comes just days after Jammui, where a teenager was allegedly harassed and molested on a public road.
18:11Like in the case of Jammui, another Bihar minister tried to trivialize Samastipur's horror.
18:35The opposition is now attacking the government that had retained power, reminding people of the Jangal Raj during Lalu Yadav's
18:42rule.
19:00Samastipur's M.P.S. condemned the incident.
19:24A minor girl is surrounded, dragged and targeted in public.
19:28The video is horrific. But what is equally disturbing is the reaction.
19:33From real culture to incidents happen in U.S. and Japan too, the political response sounds more like an explanation
19:39than an alarm.
19:40Bihar doesn't need comparisons. What it needs is accountability.
19:45With Shashi Bhushan, Vira Report, India Today.