India news: Opposition leaders march towards Election Commission

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Over the last week, mass protests against Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar have been launched by India's opposition parties and also the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) youth-led movement.

The outcry comes after The Indian Express newspaper last month reported divisions ​in India's poll body over the revision of voter lists.

Kumar heads the three-member Election Commission which is overseeing the voter roll revisions. 

The Indian Express reported that two of his fellow election commissioners raised at least 14 formal objections over 10 months regarding voter registrations, deletions and restorations, as well as control of electoral roll data, but those concerns were not taken into consideration.  

Concerns emerged over the Election Commission's neutrality following the report. 

Opposition leaders and critics say that those struck off the lists in the voter roll revisions include a huge number of minority voters.

They have accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi's BJP of using the exercise as a tool to secure future electoral gains, questioning the body's independence.

"The election commission is a puppet in the hands of the government. We are fighting to save ​our democracy," Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge, told the media ahead of the opposition march on Tuesday.

The Election Commission of India rejects allegations of wrongdoing and says the exercise removes deceased, relocated and duplicate voters and also prevents the inclusion of "foreign illegal immigrants."

Kumar became the CEC in 2025 after being chosen by a selection panel led by Modi. 

Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi, who was also a part of the panel, had opposed Kumar's appointment. 

On Monday, India's top court issued notices to the Election Commission of India, the Modi government, Kumar and the other two election commissioners, seeking their response to a batch of petitions against the CEC over the alleged irregularities in the revision of electoral rolls. 

If "there are decisions against the law ... We will take care of it," the Supreme Court said. 

Dramatic visuals emerged from the opposition lawmakers' protest demanding the ​resignation of the country's ​chief election ‌commissioner on Tuesday as Congress' Rahul Gandhi and his sister Priyanka Gandhi Vadra tried to breach the security barricades. 

Rahul Gandhi waved the Indian national flag as he climbed atop a police barricade.

Indian media reports said that Rahul and Priyanka Gandhi were detained briefly by the police, along with other protesters but the two leaders have now made their way into the Akashvani Bhavan building premises close to the Election Commission, continuing their stir, visuals show. 

Akashvani Bhavan is the headquarters of India's state-owned public radio, the All India Radio (AIR).

Visuals on news agency ANI show the Gandhi siblings staging an apparent sit-in under a tree inside the Akashvani Bhavan premises.

Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) National Spokesperson Sambit Patra has held a press conference in New Delhi ahead of INDIA bloc's protest march, where he accused the opposition of attempting to "create anarchy" in a bid to "launch and relaunch" leader of the oppostion Rahul Gandhi. 

Patra alleged that opposition parties, especially Gandhi's Congress, were orchestrating a " sponsored attempt" to show "how change of power can be brought about in the country and Rahul Gandhi be made to sit in power just like that. For this, a blow to India's democracy and constitutional bodies is being hurled in a sponsored manner."

Meanwhile, Gandhi joined the oppostion MPs at the parliament in the protest against Chief Election Commisoner Gyanesh Kumar on Tuesday.

The Congress leader posted a video on X where he can be seen holding a placard saying "GYANESH, IT'S DONE BRO!" a phrase popularized on social media during the mass demonstrations against the poll body head that have gripped India in recent days.

"Time to resign," Gandhi wrote on X, amplifying the demands for Kumar to step down.

Visuals on Indian news channels showed hundreds of security personnel being deployed alongside multiple layers of barricading outside ​the Parliament and Election Commission headquarters to prevent the protesting lawmakers from marching ahead.

The Rapid Action Force (RAF), which is responsible for crowd control, was also stationed along the planned protest route.

Other footage showed leaders of opposition parties assembling at one of the gates of the Indian parliament holding up banners and placards saying "Save Democracy" and "Save my vote".

Shiv Sena (UBT) MP Sanjay Raut called out the scale of security arrangements ahead of the march, saying the protest was intended to be peaceful.

"We are MPs. We are members of Parliament. We are also citizens of this country. Why is there a need to deploy such a large force to stop us? We will walk and go. We are unarmed," news agency PTI quoted Raut as saying.

Leaders and MPs from India's opposition parties are set to carry out a protest march to the Election Commission of India's (ECI) headquarters in New Delhi on Tuesday as they call for the sacking of Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar following voter-list changes. 

Security arrangements have been beefed up around the national poll body's headquarters, media reported Tuesday morning.

The INDIA bloc  — the Congress-led alliance of opposition parties — announced the march last week as part of a broader 'Save Democracy' campaign under which its leaders have been holding demonstrations since October 2 over alleged irregularities made by the ECI.

The opposition is demanding the removal of Kumar, who is facing allegations of taking unilateral action in connection with mass culling of names from registered voter lists.

Critics say the action, called the Special Intensive Revision (SIR),  has disenfranchised millions of eligible voters by removing their names from voter lists and that the changes benefit Prime Minister Narendra Modi's governing Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP). 

The ECI and the BJP reject the allegations. 

Around 130 million names have been removed from electoral rolls since the changes began last year. 

The opposition march on Tuesday will begin from Parliament House.

INDIA bloc leaders are later also expected to meet President Droupadi Murmu to raise concerns over the SIR exercise, reports said.

This is Dharvi Vaid Dhulia from DW's Studio in New Delhi, bringing you our daily offering of all the biggest headlines from India.  

Demands for the ouster of India's top poll official, Gyanesh Kumar, following contentious changes to voter rolls are set to reach the Election Commission of India's doorstep — quite literally — with opposition leaders and MPs planning a protest march to the election body's headquarters in New Delhi Tuesday.

Meanwhile, another protest seeking Kumar's resignation looms as India's 'cockroach' protesters have announced a return to Jantar Mantar —  the same site in the heart of the Indian capital from where the online satirical movement was propelled to the mainstream and forced India's education minister to step down. The Cockroach Janta Party's protest is slated for October 10. 

And amid all the pressure that is mounting in the country over allegations of widespread voter-list manipulation, by-elections are underway in three states and one Union Territory.