Congress Calls EC Note on SIR 'Wishy-Washy', Alleges Damage Control

The Congress on Saturday dismissed the Election Commission's press note on concerns surrounding the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) exercise as "wishy-washy", accusing the poll panel of being in damage-control mode.

Jairam Ramesh, Congress MP and general secretary (communications), said in a post on X that the Commission's note raised further questions about its "intent, integrity, impartiality and credibility". He was responding to the EC's statement issued after an investigation reported notes of dissent by Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi on SIR-related steps.

Ramesh said the Commission had not directly denied the story or its findings, and had instead made a defensive attempt to downplay them without calling the allegations baseless.

On Goa, where 97 voters' names were deleted despite their eligibility, Ramesh said the EC had stated that Form 6 had already been filled out for the inclusion of 81 of those voters. He described this as disenfranchising voters through a flawed system and then claiming they were being added back.

He further said the EC's statement sought to justify its actions by citing a Supreme Court order dated May 27, 2026, and asked why deadlines for voter registration had been extended in Delhi and Maharashtra but not for voters in Karnataka, Telangana, Bihar and West Bengal.

Ramesh also accused the Commission of avoiding questions about what he called the deliberate targeting of Gen Z voters, alleging illegal changes to Form 6 from mid-July 2026 that placed an unfair burden on them to disclose parents' or grandparents' details.

The party said Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar was hiding behind bureaucratic language and protocol, and was "exposed" as the country sought accountability.

Pawan Khera, head of the Congress's media and publicity department, called the press note "too lame, too little, too late". He said the statement left several questions unanswered and did not address the objections raised by two Election Commissioners over alterations to Form 6 for new voters, adding that the objection remained unresolved even after what he described as a so-called unanimous meeting.

Khera said no press note or claim of unanimity could save the CEC's face until that legal objection was answered, and called on him to resign.

Amid calls for the CEC's removal, Rahul Gandhi alleged that the poll panel chief had been put in charge of "match-fixing" India's elections by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Home Minister Amit Shah. He made the allegation while sharing a post from Kerala Congress citing media reports that Kumar, a former IAS officer, had asked a former Kerala chief secretary to contest on a BJP ticket after retirement.

Gandhi alleged that Kumar, then a serving IAS officer, was used to recruit for the BJP before being made the "umpire". There was no immediate response from the CEC to the claims.