Aland Voter Fraud: What the Karnataka CID Said It Had Asked the EC But Did Not Receive
Sangeeta Barooah Pisharoty
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New Delhi: The Karnataka police’s criminal investigation department (CID) had written at least four times – unsuccessfully – this year to the state's chief electoral officer (CEO) seeking the IP addresses of devices that were allegedly used to make fraudulent deletion applications in the Aland assembly constituency.
The letters addressed to the state CEO by the probe agency were to take forward its investigation into allegations raised in 2023 that thousands of names of genuine voters were deleted from the electoral rolls of the Aland constituency. The state had gone to polls in 2023, in which the then-ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) lost to the Congress.
Documents seen by The Wire showed that the CID had written to the CEO this past January 16, underlining: “During the course of investigation, the IP [internet protocol] logs are [were] provided [by the CEO. However], On perusal, Destination IP and Destination Port are [were] missing.”
The letter had further said: “Therefore, it is requested to direct the concerned to provide the same.”
The destination IP addresses and the destination port numbers – which are unique numerical labels – that were assigned to the receiving devices on networks through which the deletion applications in Aland were filed would be crucial to the CID's investigation.
The case is based on an FIR filed at the Aland police station by the district electoral registration officer (ERO) in 2023, which was later transferred to the state CID for investigation. The ERO acted after Congress MLA B.R. Patil and local BLOs had complained about incidents of forgery to election authorities.
Documents showed that the deputy superintendent of police of the CID's cybercrime division had also asked the following questions to the CEO:
Whether OTP/Multi-factor authentication facility is adopted in NVSP [National Voter Service Portal] and VHA [Voters’ Services Portal] apps, platforms;
Whether OTP/authentication facility is extended to upload the applications. If so, provide details;
If authentication like OTP is existed, whether the OTP will be sent to the mobile number used for log-in or mobile number provided in the form by applicant or both?
Provide the certificate U/s65 B of the Indian Evidence Act 1872 by the person holding lawful control/user from where the logs were created during the activities and generated to produce before LEA [law enforcement agency].
Further the Supreme Court [had] held that “65B certificate is mandatory for admissibility of electronic evidence in secondary form” in the judgement Arjun Panditrao Khotkar vs Kailash Kushanrao Gorantyal on July 14, 2020.”
Direct the concerned to arrange a presentation with respect to allegation made and steeply step usage of NVSP, VHA and Garuda apps from the voter/public perspective to the investigation team.
Since then, the same information was sought in letters sent to the state CEO by the CID three more times – on February 1, February 14 and February 25, 2025.
Documents also showed that the state CEO wrote a letter to Pramod Kumar Sharma, principal secretary at the Election Commission (EC), on February 4 informing him about the specific information sought by the state investigating agency in the matter.
Since no information was shared by the EC, the Karnataka CEO had written another letter to Sharma on March 14.
At a press conference held in New Delhi on Thursday (September 18), Congress leader Rahul Gandhi alleged that the names of voters in Aland were deleted from electoral rolls following applications filed using fake phone numbers that may have involved the use of a software in a centralised, coordinated fashion.
Gandhi also said that voters in traditional Congress strongholds were particularly targeted.
The opposition leader alleged that systematic voter fraud was carried out and that Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar is knowingly shielding the perpetrators.
Though the Karnataka CEO appears to have failed to arrange a presentation for the CID team, as requested by it multiple times, the EC however issued a response to Gandhi’s allegation on X soon after his presser on Thursday, stating that “no deletion of any vote can be done online by any member of the public”.
The Karnataka CEO has since acknowledged Gandhi's allegation that 6,018 attempts were indeed made to delete electors from Aland's rolls – of which a mere 24 deletion applications were found to be genuine – and that an FIR had been lodged once ground-level verification by election personnel brought this to light.
The CEO also said that all information available with the commission – including IP addresses – were provided to the police, but it is unclear if destination IP addresses and port numbers were part of the data shared.
In 2023, Rajiv Kumar was chief election commissioner. Serious allegations of electoral roll manipulation had been raised in Maharashtra and Haryana, where the BJP had won elections, during Kumar’s tenure. Opposition parties have since demanded that punitive action be taken against him.
While the BJP called those allegations lies, reports by independent media did show an unexplained voter spike before the assembly elections in Maharashtra.
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