The Karnataka government is stepping up to investigate serious claims of voter fraud in the Aland Assembly constituency. Chief Minister Siddaramaiah announced on Saturday that a Special Investigation Team (SIT) will look into the “Vote Chori” allegations raised by Congress leader and Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi. Gandhi pointed out that around 6,000 voters’ names were targeted for deletion before the 2023 Assembly elections, and the CM confirmed those details while speaking in Gadag.
This move comes amid growing tensions over election integrity in Karnataka. Rahul Gandhi accused the system of tampering with voter lists to favor rivals, sparking a heated debate. The development could ignite fresh political clashes between the ruling Congress and opposition BJP.
Rural Development Minister Priyank Kharge and Aland MLA B.R. Patil fired back at the Election Commission of India (ECI) during a press conference in Bengaluru on Friday. They called the ECI’s denial of wrongdoing a “complete lie.” Kharge criticized the commission for claiming it stopped the fraud on its own after Gandhi highlighted it. “They act like they caught it first, but that’s not true,” he told reporters.
Patil, who represents Aland, shared a gripping story from his own campaign. Back in early 2023, a villager named Vijay Kumar from Kamanalli contacted him, saying someone filed a request to remove his name from the voter rolls without his knowledge. Soon, similar complaints poured in. In total, 6,018 applications targeted voters who backed Congress—enough to swing the close race against Patil.
“We were shocked,” Patil recalled. He acted fast: On February 10, he wrote to the Kalaburagi district collector. The next day, he and Kharge held a press conference. By February 13, he filed a complaint with local officials, and on February 20, they escalated it to the state’s former Chief Electoral Officer. Media coverage followed, and the State Election Commission verified the claims, ordering no changes to the voter list.
The Aland election officer even filed a police complaint about fake deletion requests. But the probe hit roadblocks. First, the local deputy superintendent of police couldn’t get cooperation. Then, the Kalaburagi additional SP faced the same issues. Patil pushed for action, writing to Home Minister G. Parameshwara, who handed it to the Criminal Investigation Department (CID). Even there, the CID sent 18 letters to the ECI for details but got no responses. Now, they’re eyeing a transfer to the cyber crime unit for a deeper digital probe.
Patil didn’t hold back on the culprits. “This was a conspiracy by the BJP and the Election Commission to make me lose,” he alleged. He gave stark examples: A retired teacher named Suryakant had his voter ID misused to file deletions for 12 people—he knew nothing about it. In another case, an illiterate woman, Godhabai, supposedly submitted 12 online requests in just 14 minutes. Calls to the linked mobile numbers traced back to states like Jharkhand, Tamil Nadu, Maharashtra, and Andhra Pradesh.
The ECI insists no names were actually deleted, which Patil agrees with—but only because he stayed vigilant. “If we hadn’t acted, those votes would be gone, and I’d have lost by about 1,500 votes,” he said. He praised Rahul Gandhi for shining a national spotlight and promised more revelations soon, calling it a “hydrogen bomb” on voter fraud.
Patil urged the ECI to hand over all records for a fair SIT investigation into this Karnataka election scandal. He slammed a recent letter from Karnataka’s Joint CEO claiming everything was provided: “If that’s true, why ignore 18 CID letters?”
From the other side, BJP spokesperson Shehzad Poonawalla hit back at Gandhi’s “Vote Chori” charges. He said Gandhi isn’t a victim of the ECI but carries an “Emergency mindset” like Indira Gandhi. Poonawalla pointed to a recent High Court disqualification of Congress MLA K.Y. Nanjegowda over election code violations and dared Gandhi to address criticisms from his own party members like Shashi Tharoor and Kirti Azad.
As the SIT probe kicks off, eyes are on how it uncovers the truth behind these voter list manipulations in Aland and what it means for future elections in India.
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