'Sign Delcaration Or Apologise': ECI Rejects Rahul Gandhi's Voter Fraud Charges

Lok Sabha LoP and Congress MP Rahul Gandhi. (Photo: ANI)

The Election Commission of India (ECI) on Friday dismissed allegations of large-scale voter fraud levelled by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, accusing him of attempting to sensationalise the matter by making baseless claims in the media.

In a strongly worded statement, the poll body challenged Gandhi to either sign a formal declaration as per legal procedure or apologise to the nation for making what it called 'baseless claims' against the ECI.

"Law provides a specific procedure for both making objections to the roll and for making appeal. Instead of availing the legal processes, he tried to sensationalize the issue by making baseless claims in media. It is a settled proposition that if law requires a certain thing to happen in a certain manner, then it should be done in that manner only and not in any other manner. Therefore, if Rahul Gandhi believes in his analysis and believes that his allegations against ECI are true, he should have respect for law and sign the Declaration or Apologise to the Nation for raising absurd allegations against ECI," the poll body said in a statement.

ECI says, "The Kamal Nath judgement gives a settled position with respect to the machine readable document and raising the same issues repeatedly shows that Mr Gandhi has no respect for the Supreme Court of India’s decisions. Law provides a specific procedure for both making… — ANI (@ANI) August 8, 2025

Responding to Gandhi’s claims of irregularities in electoral rolls, the ECI added that the Congress leader was merely repeating an old script. “At his recent press conference, Rahul Gandhi repeated a tired script. In 2018, it was Kamal Nath, then President of MPCC; today, it’s the Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha playing the same tune,” the statement noted.

"At his recent press conference, Rahul Gandhi repeated a tired script. In 2018, it was then Kamal Nath, the then President MPCC; today, it’s the Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha playing the same tune. In 2018, they tried to mislead the Supreme Court by producing documents from a private website to demonstrate that there are mistakes in the electoral rolls in as much as same face was shown again for as many as 36 voters. Wherein in reality, the defects were rectified around 4 months ago and the copy of the same was supplied to the party," ECI said.

ECI says, "At his recent press conference, Rahul Gandhi repeated a tired script. In 2018, it was then Kamal Nath, the then President MPCC; today, it’s the Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha playing the same tune. In 2018, they tried to mislead the Supreme Court by producing… — ANI (@ANI) August 8, 2025

ECI statement came a day after Congress MP Rahul Gandhi on Thursday claimed that massive electoral fraud occurred in the Mahadevapura Assembly segment of Karnataka’s Bangalore Central constituency during the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

Addressing a press conference, Rahul Gandhi presented the Congress party's research on voting in the Mahadevapura Assembly and alleged that “vote chori” (vote theft) of 1,00,250 votes took place in the assembly.