Congress constitutes Prithviraj Chavan-headed panel on Maharashtra poll 'irregularities'

New Delhi: Former Maharashtra chief minister Prithviraj Chavan on Tuesday said the Congress has appointed a committee headed by him that will do a detailed analysis of the alleged irregularities in the state assembly polls and come up with recommendations to clean up the electoral process.

Chavan said about 100 leaders of the Maha Vikas Aghadi (MVA) have filed election petitions and the committee has urged the Congress leadership to have a legal team from Delhi to assist them.

In an interview with PTI, the Congress leader also claimed that in many Maharashtra constituencies, including that of his own Karad South, people cast multiple ballots by removing indelible ink.

He said one of the agenda items of the committee is to explore going back to paper ballot and the panel will speak to people and make a recommendation on it.

"There was a major meeting in Delhi yesterday which was attended by several senior Congress leaders from Maharashtra. After the meeting, we had a series of other meetings...we also called on Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge," he said.

The meeting in Delhi, chaired by AICC general secretary in-charge of Maharashtra unit, Ramesh Chennithala, and attended by Pradesh Congress president Harshwardhan Vasantrao Sapkal and many senior leaders, discussed a wide range of issues, including the "irregularities" in the 2024 assembly polls flagged prominently by Rahul Gandhi, Chavan said.

"One outcome was to take forward Rahul Gandhi's allegations that there were 41 lakh new voters added in the interim five month-period between the Lok Sabha polls and the assembly elections in Maharashtra," he said.

"The party took some decisions and constituted a committee that will be chaired by me and deliberate on the way forward so that these irregularities do not persist. Idea was to place facts before the people and then it is up to the Election Commission to decide on changing the systems," Chavan said.

About 100 candidates of the MVA have filed election petitions but the history has been such that nothing much comes out of such pleas and five years pass by, the Congress leader said.

"So we are not expecting any massive change in the results of the elections. But we want to improve the process so that it is less prone to manipulation and fraud. We should do this, otherwise it would be a sham democracy. That is the attempt that the Congress party is making," Chavan said.

Five years between the two assembly elections earlier, there were a total of 31 lakh voters added which is about 50,000 every month, he said.

However, in the five months between the Lok Sabha polls and the Maharashtra Assembly elections last year, 41 lakh got added which is about 9-10 lakh voters per month, he said and asked who are these voters.

"Deliberately multiple registrations were allowed and the Election Commission turned a blind eye. Amit Shah also gave a call that increase voting by 10 per cent on every booth. There is a double meaning that multiple registrations come in," Chavan said.

He further said that the committee will make recommendations and submit a report to Kharge.

"We would look into the irregularities and our ultimate objective is to clean up the election process. I don't want to cast aspersions on the EC but there is room to clean up the process," Chavan said.

Flagging alleged irregularities in the Maharashtra assembly polls, Gandhi has claimed that there weren't isolated glitches but "vote theft" and demanded the immediate release of machine-readable digital voter rolls as well as CCTV footage.

In his article in The Indian Express titled "Match-fixing Maharashtra", Gandhi said, "Voter rolls and CCTV footage are tools to be used to strengthen democracy, not ornaments to be locked up. The people of India have a right to be assured that no records have been or will be trashed."

He had said he doubted the fairness of Indian elections, "not every time, not everywhere, but often. I am not talking of small-scale cheating, but of industrial-scale rigging involving the capture of our national institutions".

"But if some earlier election outcomes seemed odd, the outcome of the 2024 Maharashtra Vidhan Sabha elections is glaringly strange," he had noted.

In his article, Gandhi had alleged voter turnout figures were inflated.

"Election Commission data shows that the number of registered voters in Maharashtra in the 2019 Vidhan Sabha elections was 8.98 crore, which rose five years later to 9.29 crore for the May 2024 Lok Sabha elections. But a mere five months later, by the November 2024 Vidhan Sabha elections, the number had leapt to 9.70 crore. A crawl of 31 lakh in five years, then a leap of 41 lakh in just five months," he had said.

The Election Commission had formally written to Gandhi on his allegations of rigging in the 2024 Maharashtra polls, saying all elections are held by it strictly as per laws passed by Parliament and rules.

"We presume that any issue regarding conduct of elections would have already been raised through election petitions filed in the competent court of law (high court) by the INC candidates," it told the Leader of the Opposition in Lok Sabha.

"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 poll authority had said.