Ferozepur, Sep 28 (PTI) Congress workers staged a protest here on Monday demanding the resignation and arrest of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, accusing him of “subverting and sabotaging” democracy in the country.
The protesters also burnt effigies of Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the CEC.
Leading the protest, Punjab Congress chief Amarinder Singh Raja Warring alleged that Kumar had “subverted and sabotaged” the electoral process and claimed that 13.8 crore voters had been “single-handedly disenfranchised” through deletion from electoral rolls.
Citing Bihar, West Bengal, Madhya Pradesh, Chhattisgarh and Haryana, he said the electoral outcomes in these states were contrary to ground realities and the public perception.
Warring alleged that the Election Commission (EC) under Kumar was colluding with the BJP and the RSS and deleting the names of the voters they believed were against the tow organisations.
He said when Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha Rahul Gandhi raised the issue three years ago, the EC had denied it, but claimed that the two election commissioners had now admitted what Gandhi had been saying.
Warring cautioned the Congress workers in Punjab to be alert against the deletion of names from electoral rolls.
“It was the standard practice of the Election Commission to carry out Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls in the states and delete votes to help the BJP and same thing was happening in Punjab,” he alleged.
He claimed that 20 lakh names had so far been deleted from Punjab’s electoral rolls so far and the figure could increase further.
Warring also lashed out at the Aam Aadmi Party government in Punjab, saying the ruling party and the BJP were two sides of the same coin. He cited alleged instances of the AAP government “subverting” the results of municipal committee elections in Punjab.
The Ludhiana MP alleged that the AAP government was “institutionalising” the criminalisation of politics in Punjab. He apprehended that the time was not too far when only criminals and gangsters like Jaggu Bhagwanpuira and Gurpreet Sekhon, with dozens of serious criminal cases registered against them, will be contesting elections.
He accused both Chief Minister Bhagwant Mann and SAD president Sukhbir Singh Badal of encouraging gangster culture in Punjab. PTI COR CHS RHL
This report is auto-generated from PTI news service. ThePrint holds no responsibility for its content.