Vote Chori: Fresh FIR in Karnataka Over Mahadevapura Voter Fraud Allegation
The Wire Staff
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Mumbai: The Whitefield police registered a case of electoral fraud following a complaint by a local Congress leader alleging widespread addition of bogus voters to the Mahadevapura electoral rolls ahead of the 2024 Lok Sabba elections.
The complainant, Y. Vinoda, is Congress Marathahalli block committee’s president. The FIR is lodged under several sections of the Bhartiya Nyaya Sanhita (BNS) and Representation of People's Act, 1951.
The complaint is based on the allegations levelled by Leader of Opposition (LoP) Rahul Gandhi in a press conference held in New Delhi on August 7, 2025.
Gandhi had alleged that there were 1,00,250 fake voters in the Mahadevapura assembly constituency, including duplications, large number of voters registered at a single address, among others.
A news report in The Hindu points to a similar complaint that was registered in Andhra Pradesh but was later withdrawn.
The Andhra Pradesh government had formed a Special Investigation Team (SIT) to probe an FIR based on a complaint lodged by a Telugu Desam Party MLA alleging voter fraud in his constituency. It was withdrawn after the Election Commission of India (ECI) objected to the same.
In her complaint to the Whitefield police, Vinoda said: “Based on publicly available information, I have learnt that, in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections in the Bengaluru Central Parliamentary Constituency, a large number of fake voters were added to the electoral rolls of Mahadevapura Assembly constituency, thereby undermining the public mandate. It would not have been possible to include such a large number of fake voters in the voter list without the active conspiracy of government officials, members of the political party that benefited from such manipulation, and other unknown private individuals. The revelation of this voter list fraud is a matter of grave concern relating to our democratic processes.”
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