In 1896, when Mahatma Gandhi was in Durban, in South Africa, he did not know that his name figured in the voters’ list until someone contesting the election brought to his notice. Not having been keen to exercise his franchise he, however, was curious to know how his name was enrolled in the voter’s list. He sensed that the person who brought to his knowledge about his name in the voters’ list and asked for his vote might have put his name there.So he felt that voters’ lists are prepared keeping in mind the favourable prospects of victory of a particular candidate in the electoral fray.While recalling that experience, Gandhi while speaking at the Federal Structure Committee in the Round Table Conference held in London on September 17, 1931, flagged the importance of adult suffrage for all regardless of gender, faith, caste and economic status and stated that he knew about voting process and how the registration officer put names on the voters’ list.Then he stated the manner in which his name was placed in the voters’ list in Durban without letting him know about it and the person who brought that information to his knowledge asked his vote. Gandhi proceeded to add, “…since then, I have known that is how voters’ lists are prepared”.Rahul’s exposeIn 2025, it is instructive to recall those 1931 utterances of Gandhi, “…I have known how “voters’ lists are prepared” to fathom the massive expose of Rahul Gandhi of the alleged fraudulent electoral roll prepared in 2024 for Mahadevapura Assembly constituency of the Bangalore Central Lok Sabha seat. Rahul has accused the Election Commission of India (ECI) of enabling the BJP to commit “vote chori, (vote theft)” so that Narendra Modi could become Prime Minister.That extraordinary expose was based on the Bangalore Central Lok Sabha constituency’s 2024 electoral roll consisting of lakhs of pages and supplied by ECI. It took six months of arduous exercise by the Congress team to unearth the manifold form of manipulation enabling addition of more than one lakh voters to it on dubious grounds. Rahul alleged that the questionable basis for adding those voters in the electoral roll represented a model or pattern adopted by BJP for allegedly executing, as stated earlier, a systemic plan for “vote theft.”The curtain behind that alleged electoral fraud of mammoth scale was lifted by Rahul after analysing voluminous pages of electoral roll. The whole nation was stunned beyond measure that the mandate of the people was allegedly plundered to benefit BJP and Modi.So much is being talked about digital India by the Modi regime to appropriate credit for having employed information technology in every field of collective lives. The ECI’s stubborn stand not to supply electoral roll in digital form to Congress indicates its intent to deter people’s easy and quick access to information concerning the voters’ list and point out discrepancies in it within a short time.Also Read: Bihar SIR Violates Legislative Intent of the Constituent Assembly, Ambedkar’s VisionIn face of such a challenge, the Congress team manually scanned lakhs of pages of electoral roll supplied deliberately by ECI. With clinical precision Rahul proved before the public the alleged vote theft in five ways : duplicate voters(12,000 ), fake or invalid addresses(40,000), bulk voters at a single address(10,400), invalid photos(4,000), and misuse of Form 6(33,600). Thus he charged that a total of 1,00,250 fake votes in the electoral roll of one Assembly seat was incorporated by ECI in close collaboration of BJP to ensure the victory of the latter.Rahul asserted that by following that model in at least 25 Lok Sabha seats, BJP secured victory and if Modi has become Prime Minister in 2024 it is because of the manipulation of electoral rolls putting BJP in an advantageous position.Claims of stolen mandate in 2024It may be recalled that in July 2024, the Vote for Democracy (Maharashtra), released a report. “Report: Conduct of Lok Sabha Elections 2024 – Analysis of ‘Vote Manipulation’ and Misconduct during Voting and Counting. ” The press release issued by Teesta Seetalvad on its findings stated, “There appears to be a clear-cut manipulation’ and it claimed “ …close to 5 crore vote hikes has benefitted BJP/NDA to secure at least 76 seats, which it may have lost in the absence of such hike”.Soon after the 2024 general election results, Parkala Prabhakar spoke in Chennai on August 8 2024 on the theme “2024: Is the Mandate Stolen?” explaining the entire process and being unsparingly sarcastic towards the ECI! Inaction by ECINow Rahul Gandhi’s expose of “vote theft” anchored in authentic documents of ECI prima facie is persuasive and convincing. It is rather strange that ECI, instead of stating that investigation would be conducted on the issues raised by Rahul has described his expose as misleading without substantiating how it is so.Even its insistence that he should submit an affidavit citing his objections as per 20(3)(b) of the The Registration of Electors Rules, 1960, runs contrary to those Rules which are applicable only in the context of draft electoral rolls(EL) and not on any expose based on final ELs.Constitution and right to vote imperilledRahul’s expose and inaction of ECI to take any concrete action to address it has set alarming bells across the nation. Apart from pointing at phenomenal loss of credibility of ECI and its independent functioning, his uncovering of the alleged robbery of votes underlined how the universal adult suffrage forming part of the idea of Swaraj during the freedom struggle and enshrined in the Constitution has been imperilled.That is why, a day after the expose, in a rally on “Vote Adhikar”, (Right to Vote) organised in Bengaluru, Rahul began his speech stating that the rally constituted an initiative to protect the constitution and its foundation of ‘one man, one vote’.Among others he demanded that ECI should provide electoral rolls in electronic form. It is rather sad that on the occasion of 75th anniversary of the Constitution of India people’s right to vote has to be flagged in face of the alleged manipulation of electoral roll at the hands of ECI. Gandhi and Ambedkar’s visionMahatma Gandhi wrote in Young India on June 18, 1931 that among the manifold aspects of Swaraj, adult suffrage constituted a key aspect which he interpreted as a form of direct action of people against powers that be. Manipulation of the electoral rolls leading to vote theft fatally impairs people’ ability to directly act against those wielding power.While moving article 289 (now Article 324) of the draft Constitution on June 15, 1949, B.R. Ambedkar warned that no injustice should be done by the Election Commission of India while preparing electoral roll and any thing contrary to it would “….cut at the very root of democratic government.”To uphold the vision of Gandhi and Ambedkar, ECI must act on Rahul’s expose to remedy alleged egregious blunders committed while preparing electoral rolls.S.N. Sahu served as Officer on Special Duty to President of India K R Narayanan.