The Congress has approached the Election Commission of India with a memorandum, stating “serious and grave inconsistencies” in the polling and counting processes for the recently concluded Maharashtra Assembly elections. The memorandum signed by Maharashtra Congress president Nana Patole, MP Mukul Wasnik, and CWC member Ramesh Chennithala sought an in-person hearing to present evidence and raise constituency-wise discrepancies as well.

The Congress, in the memorandum, has raised two primary issues — the “arbitrary deletion of voters and subsequent addition of over 10,000 voters in each constituency from the final voter lists” and “Inexplicable increase in voting percentages from 5:00 PM to the final voter percentage declared by the Election Commission at 11:30 PM on the day of polling”.

Here is a memorandum just submitted to @ECISVEEP on the Maharashtra assembly elections by Shri @NANA_PATOLE, Shri @MukulWasnik, and Shri Ramesh @chennithala

They have raised serious issues which are being discussed in the public domain. They have asked the EC for an in-person… pic.twitter.com/K4zfx5tjhF

— Jairam Ramesh (@Jairam_Ramesh) November 29, 2024

The Congress alleged that in the days preceding the voting day of November 20, the party and its Maha Vikas Aghadi allies came to know about “different means being adopted by the ruling regime to commit large-scale electoral fraud across the Assembly Constituencies in Maharashtra”.

It alleged that among the malpractices was the arbitrary deletion of voters from the voter list and “insertion of around 10,000 names per constituency across Maharashtra”. This purportedly resulted in an unprecedented increase of nearly 47 lakh voters between July 2024 – November 2024, the Congress said.

It further alleged that there were several discrepancies in the voter turnout data for the Maharashtra Assembly elections. The Congress said that as per the data from the EC, the polling percentage across the state at 5:00 PM was 58.22%. The turnout was later reported to be 65.02%. as of 11:30 PM on the same day. “There was another increase in the voting percentage, ultimately being reported as 66.05%, several hours prior to counting,” the memorandum read.