Tens of thousands of protesters gathered near the Mandi House in New Delhi on Monday for the ‘March for Democracy’ called by the INDIA bloc towards the Supreme Court, demanding the resignation of chief election commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar over irregularities in the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and large scale voter deletions.
Lakshya Singh, 21, a Congress worker said he has been protesting against the CEC for weeks. After marching from Mandi House to Barakhamba Road (towards CP) and back to Mandi House and Bhagwan Das Road, Congress leaders Rahul Gandhi and Mallikarjun Kharge along with other Opposition leaders filed a petition at the apex court regarding SIR irregularities. “We have been living in Delhi for decades now but my sister’s vote was deleted from the voter’s list. We are all angry. Many young students have been detained. We are here to support Rahul ji. We need someone to make Gyanesh resign. Why is the CJI not meeting the opposition leaders? Why is there so much hesitation in taking action against the CEC? It looks like the entire election commission is corrupt but we are not going to tolerate this. Students dressed up as batman, superman and even Raavan showed up to the protest with posters, whistles and drums to show solidarity with the leaders. Congress chief Kharge also wore a batman mask to support the students. In the last few days, the Delhi police have detained Aam Aadmi Party (AAP), Congress, INDIA bloc and Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) leaders and protesters in New Delhi, lodged cases against them and detained them for hours. “We don’t want the government to ignore us. It has been doing so by not allowing us to protest, which is making us even angrier.
We all want to vote and have a fair say in deciding our leaders,” he said. Several protesters said they were surprised that they were allowed to assemble for hours without being detained by the police. There is a trust deficit, and if the government does not take action against the CEC, it will only grow bigger,” he said.
I have brought my entire family here today.
