New Delhi: Opposition members of the INDIA bloc stepped up their ongoing protest demanding Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar’s resignation and a rollback of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the electoral rolls by taking out a march on Monday (October 12) in central Delhi to the Supreme Court of India, with the top leaders signing a joint petition raising the irregularities in the conduct of the exercise.The march which saw several hundreds participating resulted in a show of opposition strength, cadre mobilisation while also including spontaneous public participation. The march to the Supreme Court marked a departure from the last two days when the Delhi Police had sought to crackdown on protesters in the capital with widespread detentions, including of journalists, while Delhi was turned into a fortress with movement restricted. On Monday however, the Delhi Police, RAF and other central forces stood aside and enabled the march as leader of opposition Rahul Gandhi was joined by other top leaders of the INDIA bloc including Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge, MP Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, Samajwadi Party chief Akhilesh Yadav, NCP(SP)’s Supriya Sule, CPI(M)’s M.A. Baby, CPI(ML)’s Dipankar Bhattacharya, TMC MP Sagarika Ghose among others. The march came after Gandhi addressed a press conference issuing a call to the citizens to join him from Barakhamba Road to the Supreme Court. During the press conference Gandhi said that Kumar should resign and turn “approver”.“My message to Gyanesh Kumar: Turn approver. You have committed a crime. Frankly, you are not the main criminal. You have made a mistake, but you are not the mastermind behind it. We are after the people who are behind what you did. It is easy for you to resign, get out of the way,” he said.Gandhi said that the real mastermind was Prime Minister Narendra Modi and union home minister Amit Shah and said “Gyanesh Kumar is unable to sleep at night”. “I am telling him directly, you will not survive as CEC,” he said.In this image posted on Oct. 12, 2026, Congress President Mallikarjun Kharge and party leader Priyanka Gandhi Vadra, TMC chief and former West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee, NCP(SP) leader Supriya Sule, RJD leader Tejashwi Yadav and others gather at the Constitution Club of India (CCI) their “March for Democracy” to the Supreme Court, in New Delhi. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi is also seen. Photo: @supriya_sule/XDuring the press conference Gandhi also raised the presence of over 20,000 security personnel in Delhi brought ahead of the October 10 protest called by the Cockroach Janta Party (CJP) and asked why Delhi is being “jailed.”““People are being stopped from reaching Delhi. Trains, buses are being stopped. Delhi has been converted into a fortress. Why is Delhi in jail?” he said.Following the press conference the opposition MPs met at Constitution Club on Kharge’s invitation, following which they got into buses to go to Barakhamba Road, from where the march would begin. In the lead bus, Gandhi sat with other INDIA bloc leaders to portray a united front, including Samajwadi Party MP Dharmendra Yadav, RJD’s Tejashwi Yadav, Shiv Sena (UBT)’s Raut, apart from Baby, Banerjee, CPI MP P. Sandosh Kumar. JMM’s Mahua Manjhi was also present along with Congress chief ministers D.K. Shivakumar from Karnataka and Himachal Pradesh chief minister Sukhvinder Singh Sukku.While former West Bengal chief minister Mamata Banerjee was present at Constitution Club, she did not attend the march as she had to travel to Kolkata. Samajwadi Party’s Yadav on the other hand joined the last leg of the march at about 4 pm.AISA president Neha Bora, who has emerged as a strong face of the ongoing youth-led protests was also in Gandhi’s bus with former AISA president and CPI(ML) leader N. Sai Balaji. Sources said that the presence of Bora in the bus, and other student leaders was decided by the members of the INDIA bloc led by the Congress in an effort to show the coming together of political parties, student organisations and civil society groups. Activist Yogendra Yadav was also present in the bus.All India Students’ Association (AISA) National President Neha Bora, activist Yogendra Yadav and others in a bus proceed towards Supreme Court, to file a petition against Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar and ‘vote chori’, during a protest march by INDIA bloc leaders, at Constitution Club of India, in New Delhi, Monday, Oct. 12, 2026. Photo: PTI/Atul Yadav.The Wire has learnt that while Gandhi has invited INDIA bloc MPs for evening tea today, opposition parties will be conducting their own programmes against the SIR in the coming days. In the last week, the INDIA bloc had taken to the streets of the capital, including Gandhi’s eight-hour sit at Akashwani Bhawan premises when the INDIA bloc’s march to the Election Commission was stopped, followed by a bid to reach Jantar Mantar the next day. While both days ended with detentions, the opposition then paid a symbolic visit to the Gandhi Smarak in Rajghat and an appointment with a memorandum to the President Droupadi Murmu on Friday.The march on Monday culminated in the Supreme Court of India where Gandhi and other leaders arrived while sitting on the bus’s roof. While the joint petition had already been filed earlier online, the leaders came and signed it in person. The petition has sought apart from suspension of the SIR, all the files and documents pertaining to the decision on conducting SIR’ since 24.6.2025 be placed on record, examine whether the decisions of the Election Commission were majority decisions during the conduct of the SIR, an independent committee headed by a Retired SC Judge to conduct an independent audit of SIR, who will also review the use and deployment of EVMs with reference to global best practices and ensure Form 6 is in the conformity with electoral laws.