In a startling revelation from Phulwari Sharif, Patna, the names of 180 voters from a single village have been deleted from the draft voter rolls, despite the fact that all of them are alive and had cast their votes in the last election. This incident has cast a shadow over the credibility of the election commission of india (ECI), especially because it comes on the heels of their statement in the supreme court that they would not be providing the list of 65 lakh excluded voters. The refusal to share these details now appears even more suspicious in light of such glaring and unexplained deletions.
This isn’t just about clerical errors—it’s about a consistent pattern that opposition parties and activists have long accused the ECI of enabling. Critics point out that until the maharashtra elections, the allegations revolved around votes being added to favor the BJP, often in contested constituencies. But now, in Bihar, the complaint is about mass deletions—a shift from inflating voter lists to pruning them in ways that could potentially suppress votes from certain communities or political strongholds. Such selective tampering, if proven, poses a serious threat to the fairness of the electoral process.
For the villagers affected, this is not just a matter of political gamesmanship—it’s the outright denial of their constitutional right to vote. Being erased from the voter list without notice means losing one's voice in the democratic process, and restoring it often involves long bureaucratic struggles. As more such cases emerge, the ECI’s neutrality is coming under intense public scrutiny. Unless the Commission takes transparent corrective action and explains these deletions, the perception will grow that it is no longer an impartial guardian of India’s elections, but an active player in shaping outcomes.
This isn’t just about clerical errors—it’s about a consistent pattern that opposition parties and activists have long accused the ECI of enabling. Critics point out that until the maharashtra elections, the allegations revolved around votes being added to favor the BJP, often in contested constituencies. But now, in Bihar, the complaint is about mass deletions—a shift from inflating voter lists to pruning them in ways that could potentially suppress votes from certain communities or political strongholds. Such selective tampering, if proven, poses a serious threat to the fairness of the electoral process.
For the villagers affected, this is not just a matter of political gamesmanship—it’s the outright denial of their constitutional right to vote. Being erased from the voter list without notice means losing one's voice in the democratic process, and restoring it often involves long bureaucratic struggles. As more such cases emerge, the ECI’s neutrality is coming under intense public scrutiny. Unless the Commission takes transparent corrective action and explains these deletions, the perception will grow that it is no longer an impartial guardian of India’s elections, but an active player in shaping outcomes.