Bihar Assembly Elections 2025: EC team evades questions on 'ghuspaithiya' and 'vote theft'

Patna: Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar on Sunday evaded queries related to issues raised by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi on the issue of ‘ghuspaithiya’ (infiltrators) and ‘vote theft’ respectively, but expressed his full satisfaction over the manner in which Bihar voters’ list was ‘purified’ by weeding out bogus voters through the Special Intensive Revision (SIR).

“We are extremely happy and satisfied with the way SIR has been conducted in Bihar.

"This ‘purification’ of voters list in the State was quite necessary as it brought down the genuine voters from 7.89 crore to 7.42 crore voters.

Anyone who is not eligible to vote has been struck off the list and those who are eligible have been added to the electoral roll,” said the CEC, flanked by the Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Dr Vivek Joshi.

The CEC was responding to a query that every time Prime Minister Modi or Home Minister Amit Shah visits Bihar, they raise the issue that there are many infiltrators in the state who reside here and participate in the voting process.

Though evading a reply on how many such infiltrators were found during the contentious SIR exercise, the CEC also skipped the charge of ‘vote theft’ levelled by Rahul Gandhi and asked the Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) of Bihar, Vinod Gunjyal, to get the matter investigated when given a specific information about more than 100 persons from a particular community being added at a particular booth in Muzaffarpur.

Earlier, the Congress delegation, which met the CEC, too had pointed out about 247 voters found in a particular house in Jamui even after the final electoral roll was published.

“There are many such voters who do not have a house. So, we allot the next door person’s house number to identify such voters. As a consequence, there is a possibility that one house may have many voters,” explained the CEC, discounting any wrong-doings or illegality in the preparation of the electoral roll.

“Over 90,000 BLOs have done a commendable job in purifying the voters’ list in Bihar and we are thoroughly satisfied with their work,” said the CEC without taking the name of Rahul Gandhi or going into his charge of ‘vote theft’.

New Initiatives

The CEC also pointed out new initiatives like reduced crowds at polling stations, which, in turn, will lead to shorter queues at the booths and special counters to deposit mobile phones. “No body wants to leave his or her phone nowadays. So, we will have special counters where you can deposit your phone and take it back after voting,” the CEC explained about some of the new initiatives being taken for the ensuing Bihar Assembly polls.

CEC on Aaadhar

About the SC directive on using Aadhaar card as one of the 12 documents, the CEC reiterated that Aadhaar was just for the purpose of identification of the person. “Aadhar is neither the proof of date of birth, nor address nor citizenship,” the CEC said before winding up his two-day Bihar visit.

The Election Commission is likely to announce the poll schedule for Bihar polls in the next couple of days.