A protest by Congress party workers escalated on Friday as police deployed water cannons to stop demonstrators marching toward the State Election Commission office, demanding the resignation of chief election commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar over alleged arbitrary decisions in the electoral process.
Independent MP from Purnea Rajesh Ranjan alias Pappu Yadav also joined the protest along with his supporters. Addressing the gathering, BPCC chief Ram accused Gyanesh Kumar of ‘murdering democracy’ through unilateral actions on the special intensive revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and voter-list decisions. He claimed the CEC had ignored written objections from the other two election commissioners and acted under the protection of the central government. He demanded Gyanesh Kumar’s immediate resignation, a public apology, and the cancellation of elections conducted under his leadership in various states, including Bihar, alleging that voter mapping had been manipulated to benefit the BJP. Purnea MP Pappu Yadav, who joined the Congress-led protest, went further, declaring that the CEC ‘should be hanged’. The march drew a large contingent of Congress leaders and workers, among them disciplinary panel chief Kapildev Prasad Yadav, former minister Kripanath Pathak, MLA Manoj Vishwas, media department head Rajesh Rathore and several former MLAs and party functionaries. Workers carried placards condemning the CEC and raised continuous slogans for his ouster.
The protest, organised by the Bihar Pradesh Congress Committee (BPCC) in line with the All India Congress Committee’s (AICC) call against the CEC and what the party terms his “acts of omission and commission,” was led by BPCC president Rajesh Ram. Now even his fellow commissioners have shown the courage to record their dissent after Rahul Gandhi’s warnings,” Ram said.
“Rahul Gandhi had exposed the EC’s irregularities through the Vote Adhikar Yatra before the state assembly polls, but both the Centre and the ECI dismissed it.
