NEW DELHI: Samajwadi Party Monday accused the CEC of “lying brazenly” that the party had not given any affidavit on the deletion of voters in Uttar Pradesh, even as Akhilesh Yadav alleged targeted deletion of backward and most backward class voters, who back SP, at the behest of the governing party.As the row over voter deletion deepened Monday, SP affidavits became the opposition’s propaganda weapon with INDIA bloc MPs holding them up during the protest against SIR of electoral rolls in Bihar and Election Commission at the Parliament entrance ahead of proceedings in the morning. SP leader Ramgopal Yadav said EC was “lying” about the affidavits, saying they were filed for 2022 state polls, while complaints were submitted about UP bypolls, including in Mainpuri.Akhilesh distributed copies of the affidavits around in Parliament complex, asserting that 18,000 complaints on stamp papers were submitted to EC in a rush after he received an EC notice asking that he support his claims about voter deletion in the 2022 state elections.Seeking to turn the row into a political weapon, Akhilesh alleged that voters from most backward groups like Maurya, Pal, Baghel and Rathore were being removed from rolls to help BJP. “They remove their names while promoting the narrative that OBCs are voting for them (BJP),” he said, adding that deletions played a role in SP’s defeat in many narrowly decided seats. “This is what we could identify in a short time. If we receive the voter lists in the format we are asking for, we can provide more such cases. Votes cast in 2019 were deleted by 2022. There is also a proper procedure for creating a voter ID but that is being ignored,” he alleged.At the same time, SP leaders alleged that SDM officers who conduct the elections are deliberately picked from “the community of the chief minister” while those seen as belonging to communities that support SP are changed.The Samajwadi chief said EC has not taken any action on its complaints filed since 2019 spanning across polls in 2022 and 2024, and not a single officer has been punished despite the petitions after BJP came to power. “It means EC listens more to BJP,” he charged.
