All polls held as per law: EC tells Rahul on Maharashtra poll rigging allegations

New Delhi: The Election Commission (EC) has written to Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi on June 12 inviting him for a meeting in person if he still had "any issues" to raise on Maharashtra election even as the poll body said it presumes that Congress candidates would have filed election petitions if they had any misgivings about it.

The letter came five days after Rahul wrote an article ‘Match-fixing in Maharashtra’ in various newspapers in which he claimed that the Assembly results were “glaringly strange” and the “scale of rigging was so desperate that, despite all efforts to conceal it, tell-tale evidence has emerged from official statistics, without reliance on any non-official source”.

EC sources said Rahul has not responded to the communication yet.

In the letter, EC Secretary Ashwani Kumar Mohal said all elections are conducted strictly as per electoral laws passed by the Parliament, Rules made therein and instructions issued by the poll body from time to time.

Mohal said the entire election process is conducted in a “decentralised manner” at the Assembly constituency level, which involved more than 1,00,186 Booth Level Officers, 288 Electoral Registration Officers, 139 General Observers, 41 Police Observers, 71 Expenditure Observers and 288 Returning Officers (ROs). There were also 1,08,026 Booth Level Agents appointed by various parties, including 28,421 of the Congress, across Maharashtra.

“We presume that any issue regarding conduct of elections would have already been raised through election petitions filed in the competent court of law by the Congress candidates. However, if you still have any issues, you are welcome to write to us and the Commission is also willing to meet you in person at a mutually convenient date and time to discuss all issues,” the letter said urging Rahul to communicate a “convenient date and time” to the EC.

After his article appeared, EC sources had said the poll body will respond only if the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha formally writes to it. Sources also said levelling “unsubstantiated” charges was an “affront to the rule of law” while Rahul had asked the poll body not to share “unsigned, evasive notes” but respond to “serious” questions if it has nothing to hide.

Sources had then said the “attempt to defame” the EC after any “unfavourable” verdict was “completely absurd” and any misinformation being spread is “not only a sign of disrespect towards law, but also brings disrepute” to the thousands of representatives appointed by parties and “demotivates” lakhs of election staff who work “untiringly and transparently” during elections.