Ghost voters, duplicate IDs, model code double standards—EC’s denial and damage control

There are now far too many complaints, too many troubling incidents, from too many quarters for the Election Commission to keep up a sab-changa-si attitude. All is not well.

Illustration by Soham Sen | ThePrint Team

Last week the Election Commission put out an intriguing press release. It invited party presidents and senior leaders, as “key stakeholders”, for “interactions” on how to strengthen “electoral processes”.

This 11 March press release came after two earlier ones from the EC.

The first, hurriedly put out on a Sunday morning—2 March—rushed to clarify that duplicate EPIC (Electoral Photo Identity Card) numbers did not imply “fake voters” and were merely the result of differences in “alphanumeric series”.

The second, a few days later on 7 March, admitted and accepted that the “decades long issue” of duplicate EPIC cards was an unfortunate reality, and would be resolved in three months, or 90 days.

The agitated flurry of press releases from the Election Commission this month—first denying there was a problem, then promising to resolve it in 90 days, and finally inviting political parties for talks—shows that it has been plunged into hand-wringing panic.

The reason for the EC’s agitation was this: on 27 February, in an alarming and shocking revelation, Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee showed that India’s electoral rolls are marred by duplicate EPIC numbers.

She publicly presented exhaustive lists of voters in Bengal against whose EPIC numbers there were multiple names and entries. Voters’ names from BJP-ruled states had been uploaded onto Bengal’s electoral lists.

For example, against the EPIC number of one Mohammad Sainul Islam, a voter in Murshidabad, there was another voter—‘Sunita’ from Hisar, Haryana. In another case, a single EPIC number was revealed as belonging to three individuals: two named Suman—one a resident in Bengal, another in Haryana—and a third, Nurjamal, a resident of Murshidabad.

Waves of alarm rippled across all opposition parties, which joined hands to protest. The Congress put out a statement calling duplicate EPIC cards “startling” and “bizarre.” The Shiv Sena (UBT) published an editorial in its party paper Saamana. The RJD and Aam Aadmi Party put in notices in Parliament.

It was subsequently revealed that, despite the Election Commission’s dismissive declaration that duplicate EPIC numbers were only a minor matter, the EC’s own handbook showed that it could lead to voters being denied voting rights, because EPIC numbers are linked to photos.

 

All is not well with India’s ballot

Duplicate EPIC cards in a complex democracy like India are totally unacceptable. When vehicle licence plates are unique, when passport numbers are unique, when Aadhaar cards are unique, how can different voters have the same EPIC number?

A cornered Election Commission has now reached out for dialogue with all political parties.

For the Election Commission—usually notoriously reluctant to share information with the public and opaque about how it calculates voting percentages—this belated outreach is an admission that glaring anomalies are growing in India’s electoral system.

These frightening irregularities can no longer be swept under the carpet.

The Election Commission has still not shared information on how many duplicate EPIC cards exist. If the EC doesn’t even know the number, how exactly is it going to solve this problem in 90 days?

Also, the Election Commission says duplicate EPIC cards have existed since 2000. How many elections—assembly and Lok Sabha—since then could have been affected?

It’s not just in Bengal that these deep flaws in electoral rolls have come to the fore. After the 2024 Maharashtra assembly polls, the Congress revealed that in Maharashtra, the Election Commission registered 40 lakh new voters in the five-month period between the Lok Sabha and Vidhan Sabha elections—that is between May and October. Yet in the same state, over the five-year period between the Lok Sabha elections of 2019 and 2024, the EC registered only 32 lakh voters. The Congress called it a “logistical and statistical absurdity” that more voters were added in five months than in five years.

Other parties have also filed complaints. In Andhra Pradesh, the YSRCP challenged the relaxation of postal ballot norms. Although the Supreme Court did not find merit in the plea, the party insists that the rise in postal voters needs to be investigated.

The Biju Janata Dal has also complained to the Election Commission, alleging that there was a massive and sharp discrepancy between provisional and final voting percentages on voting day.

Parties have also voiced suspicions about the sudden jump in voting percentages post 5 pm on voting days, particularly in areas seen not to be favourable to the Bharatiya Janata Party.

During the 2024 general elections there were serious allegations of voter suppression in Sambhal, Uttar Pradesh, where the state police were accused of confiscating voter cards and not allowing certain communities to vote.

During the Delhi assembly polls of 2025, the Aam Aadmi Party alleged a sharp rise in voter deletion and addition applications. Here is a point to ponder: the Election Commission’s own data shows that between the 2020 Delhi assembly polls and the 2024 general elections, Delhi’s electorate grew by 4 lakh. But wonder of wonders, in just seven months between May 2024 and February 2025, another four lakh voters were added. It took four years to add 4 lakh new voters, but in just seven months before the assembly polls, Delhi’s rolls swelled by the same number.

Transparency activists have pointed to another disturbing development: during the 2024 polls, the EC put out voter turnout figures only in percentages, and not in absolute numbers—as was the norm earlier. It took several days for the EC to provide updated turnout figures, and when it finally did, the numbers were, strangely enough, sharply higher than initial voter turnout percentages.

The fact is, there are now just far too many complaints, too many troubling incidents, from too many quarters—from political parties to citizen groups—for the Election Commission to keep up a sab-changa-si (all-is-well) attitude. All is not well, with duplicate EPIC cards, with electoral rolls, or with sharp spikes in voter turnout percentages. The Election Commission has a constitutional duty to perform: to preserve the sanctity of India’s election process.

As the draftsman of India’s Constitution, BR Ambedkar noted, verified and credible electoral rolls—or voter lists—are the foundation of free and fair polls and thus central to democratic functioning itself. If electoral rolls are filled with “ghost voters” or “fraud voters”, or if voter lists are manipulated in any way, the election result is a fraud on the people.

Different parties, different rules?

There have been worrying signs that the Election Commission is holding the BJP and opposition parties to different standards.

In the 2025 Delhi election, the EC failed to restrain the BJP from using Budget pronouncements as poll promises in full-page newspaper advertisements. The EC has also been highly selective, in favour of the ruling BJP, in acting against hate speech. In the 2024 Lok Sabha polls, after Narendra Modi’s infamously brazen communal speech in Banswara about mangalsutras being snatched away, the EC failed to restrain or even name the vitriol-spewing PM. It was only after enormous pressure and multiple notices that the EC sent a mild message to the BJP party president about “star campaigners” in general. Previously,

Modi’s rabidly divisive speeches, such as on shamshaan-kabristan in UP in 2017, or “people creating violence can be identified by their clothes” in 2019, went unnoticed by the Election Commission.

By contrast, the EC was quick to shoot off notices to Rahul Gandhi over far less offensive remarks, like referring to Modi as panauti, which only means bad luck.

Today, the BJP-led government appears to have ensured complete control over the appointment of Election Commissioners and the Chief Election Commissioner. The autonomy of the Election Commission has been systematically dismantled by Modi and his cohorts. Using its parliamentary majority, the Modi government altered the selection panel for Election Commissioners. In 2023, it brought in a law removing the Chief Justice of India from the panel that appoints the Chief Election Commissioner.

Citizens must ask: why was the CJI removed from this selection panel?

In 2020, Election Commissioner Ashok Lavasa resigned (or, perhaps, was forced to quit) after dissenting on Model Code violations in 2019. He was swiftly sent overseas to a posting with the Asian Development Bank.

In 2024, on the eve of elections, Election Commissioner Arun Goel resigned. Two new ECs were appointed almost overnight with minimal consultation with the Leader of the Opposition. The appointment of the current CEC, Gyanesh Kumar—a former secretary in the Co-operation Ministry under Amit Shah (who had earlier served in Shah’s Home Ministry as well)—has only deepened fears of partisanship, given the Modi government’s persistent efforts to control the EC.

 

Saving democracy’s last line of defence

The EC’s reluctance to question the BJP on its many flagrant violations of the Model Code of Conduct has led to deep discontent across all Opposition parties. The EC has not been able to maintain transparency and accountability in its conduct of elections.

So far, the Election Commission has not given the Opposition much confidence that it stands as a vigilant sentinel of Article 324, which vests in it the constitutional duty of safeguarding the integrity of the election process. It would be a tragedy indeed if elections in India went the way of Bangladesh, where the poll process has lost all public trust and is regarded as fully rigged.

The Election Commission must open itself up to greater scrutiny and be willing to accept challenges to its functioning.

The Election Commission is democracy’s last hope. If it fails to make itself more accountable, our precious freedom-giving constitutional democracy will turn into a suffocating, airless autocratic prison from which there will be no escape.

Sagarika Ghose is a Rajya Sabha MP, All India Trinamool Congress. She tweets @sagarikaghose. Views are personal.

(Edited by Asavari Singh)