'Ban Amit Shah, Himanta Sarma from campaigning': Congress tells EC

New Delhi: Congress on Wednesday approached the Election Commission seeking action against Union Home Minister Amit Shah and Assam Chief Minister Himanta Biswas Sarma for making "communal" remarks during campaigning and stopping the Union government's decision to deploy civil servants and soldiers for promoting its schemes.

It also asked the EC to disqualify Madhya Pradesh minister Govind Singh Rajput's candidature for promising money to party booth chiefs for ensuring more votes than Congress.

Congress also urged the EC to instruct Telangana government to disburse money to farmers before the nomination process starts on November 3 to ensure that there are free and fair elections.

A Congress delegation led by senior leaders Jairam Ramesh and Salman Khurshid met Election Commissioners and submitted memoranda regarding their demands. Senior Congress leaders Manikrao Thakre, Revanth Reddy, Uttam Kumar Reddy, and Bhatti Vikramarka were also part of the delegation.

The delegation demanded that there should be a "clear and complete" ban on Shah from all campaign activities, alleging that he made communal remarks during a Chhattisgarh BJP rally. They were referring to Shah's statements that Baghel's appeasement politics got Bhuvneshkar Sahoo lynched.

"Merely because the author of the dangerous statements is the Home Minister, this does not exempt him from the writ of law," the Congress said in its memorandum.

The party also demanded a similar campaign ban on Sarma for his comments in Chhattisgarh, it said were "communally charged".

The memorandum said that no election in the history of the country has ever had a sitting CM "boldly, knowingly, and repeatedly make such irresponsible, reckless, and false statements during poll campaigns".

Referring to the government's decision to use civil servants and soldiers for a "political campaign poorly disguised as a government initiative", the party said the integrity of elections is "at stake" and demanded the Election Commission to act "decisively, firmly, and swiftly".

On BRS government's Rythu Bandhu Scheme, the Congress said it was not against disbursement of money to farmers, but wanted it to be finished before the commencement of nomination on November 3 for the sake of upholding Model Code of Conduct.

The party recalled that the BRS government had disbursed Rythu Bandhu funds in 2018 on the polling day which led to a "predictable swing" in favour of the ruling party.

"We believe that such electoral manipulation of voters is patently illegal and undemocratic," it said.