Congress leaders and participants at a gathering in Karnataka.
BENGALURU: Karnataka Congress will launch block-level “Save the Vote, Save the Country” padyatras from October 10 to 20, with a follow-up campaign to identify people whose names have allegedly been removed from electoral rolls, B.K. Hariprasad said at a media briefing at the KPCC office.
The programme will combine public protests with local verification of voter-list deletions. Hariprasad said party workers would conduct panchayat-level surveys, bring affected voters together and guide block presidents and booth-level agents on responding to alleged irregularities.
Block-level marches and voter surveys
Hariprasad said the marches would start from an Ambedkar or Gandhi statue and proceed to the Deputy Commissioner’s office, covering no more than five kilometres. Senior block leaders would participate. The programme would include singing the national anthem after meeting the Deputy Commissioner and burning an effigy of Gyanesh Kumar, he said.
The party would also organise meetings of people whose names had allegedly been deleted through Form 7 and other processes. He said panchayat-level verification would examine deletions through the process described in the briefing as ASDDO.
Awareness activities would continue during Dasara, followed by public meetings and media briefings from October 25 to November 25. State leaders would take part in campaigns in their respective districts, he said.
Claims of irregularities in Vijayapura and Malleshwaram
Hariprasad alleged that women who were alive in Vijayapura district had been listed as dead and that death certificates had been submitted in their names. He accused election officials of acting in the BJP’s interests.
In Malleshwaram, he said Congress had identified 1,211 votes for scrutiny and that 1,108 applications had been submitted at different polling stations in a single day. He cited these figures as part of the party’s allegations of voter-list manipulation.
Delhi protest and further mobilisation
Hariprasad also condemned what he described as police aggression during an INDIA alliance protest in Delhi involving Rahul Gandhi, Priyanka Gandhi and around 300 Lok Sabha and Rajya Sabha members. He alleged that some people had been sent in police uniforms to assault protesters.
He said Rahul Gandhi, as Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, had the right to protest against the Union government and constitutional institutions, and criticised the Election Commission’s conduct.
A major INDIA alliance protest was planned at Delhi’s Ramlila Maidan on November 1, he said. The campaign would continue until Gyanesh Kumar resigned and those Congress held responsible, including Narendra Modi and Amit Shah, faced action, he added.
Minister Satish Jarkiholi, AICC secretary Gopinath Palaniappan, KPCC media and communications department chairman Ramesh Babu and others attended the briefing.
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