Responding to Congress leader Rahul Gandhi’s claims that “duplicate Elector’s Photo Identity Cards (EPICs)” are being used to manipulate voter rolls, Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Gyanesh Kumar clarified on August 17, that EPIC duplication is not evidence of vote theft but a technical issue from past electoral processes.
“There are two possible ways duplicate EPICs can exist,” Kumar explained.
Shared EPIC Numbers Across States: “One person in West Bengal may have the same EPIC number as another in Haryana. At one point, nearly three lakh people shared duplicate EPIC numbers, which we corrected,” he said.
“Before 2003, there was no centralised Election Commission website. People who moved cities could re-register, but their earlier names weren’t always deleted. This created multiple enrolments with different EPICs. The SIR process is specifically designed to fix this,” Kumar noted.
The CEC dismissed opposition accusations that the revision exercise was being timed to favour the ruling party.
“Should we do this correction exercise after polls? Is the EC saying this? No, leaders themselves asked for revisions. Booth-level officers and agents are working together transparently,” Kumar stressed.
He reiterated that the SIR exercise is aimed at cleaning the rolls, not manipulating them.
#WATCH | Delhi: Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar says, “…The SIR exercise has not been done in the last 20 years… The SIR exercise has been carried out more than 10 times in the country. The main purpose of SIR is to purify the voter list… The SIR exercise is being… pic.twitter.com/Qj32N56pMJ
— ANI (@ANI) August 17, 2025
Gyanesh Kumar also hit back at charges of “vote chori” (vote theft), saying the law clearly provides a 45-day window to challenge elections in the High Court.
“If election petitions are not filed within 45 days, but misleading allegations are made in public rallies, then what is this if not an insult to the Indian Constitution?” he asked.
Meanwhile, Rahul Gandhi intensified his campaign against the poll body, alleging that the Election Commission was working with the BJP to manipulate voter rolls in Bihar.
“The whole country now knows that the Election Commission is stealing elections in collusion with the BJP. Their last conspiracy is voter additions and deletions through the SIR to steal the Bihar Assembly polls,” Gandhi declared at the launch of his 1,300-km Voter Adhikar Yatra in Sasaram.
With the opposition’s Voter Adhikar Yatra gaining momentum and the Election Commission doubling down on its defense of the SIR process, Bihar has emerged as the political battleground where the credibility of India’s electoral system is being tested.
The clash between the poll body and the opposition is expected to intensify in the coming weeks, as Bihar prepares for Assembly elections under heightened scrutiny.
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