The Congress government in Karnataka announced the formation of a Special Investigation Team (SIT) on Saturday to investigate allegations regarding the large-scale deletion of voter names from electoral rolls in Aland assembly constituency during the 2023 state elections. This decision follows a police complaint lodged by Congress MLA B R Patil, alleging that the names of 6,670 voters across 256 polling stations were unlawfully removed.
A verification process conducted by election officers indicated that while applications had been submitted for the deletion of 6,018 voters, only 24 of these requests were found to be legitimate. The remaining 5,994 deletion requests allegedly utilized fake mobile numbers and were submitted without the knowledge of the voters involved.
The SIT will be led by Additional Director General of Police (CID) B K Singh, with Superintendents of Police (SPs) Saidulu Adavath and Shubhanwita as members. The team has been granted authority to investigate all related cases across Karnataka, with assistance from the Criminal Investigation Department (CID) and local police forces.
The SIT’s formation follows claims made by Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, who accused the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) of deliberately removing genuine voters from the rolls in Aland to undermine the electoral process. “Somebody attempted to delete 6,018 voters’ names through software manipulation and fraudulent applications targeting minorities,” Gandhi stated. He further alleged the involvement of external forces in the operation.
In response to these allegations, Chief Minister Siddaramaiah accused the BJP of subverting democracy through systematic and centralized efforts to “steal votes.” He described the Aland incident as indicative of a broader conspiracy to manipulate electoral rolls and disenfranchise citizens.
Siddaramaiah noted that for the past 18 months, the Karnataka CID had been requesting the Election Commission (EC) to share specific technical details, including IP addresses and device ports, vital for identifying the origins of the deletions. However, he criticized the EC for not providing the necessary data.
