BJP slams Rahul Gandhi after sephologist Sanjay Kumar apologises for 'vote theft' claim
Two days after he flagged significant discrepancies in the Maharashtra Assembly election regarding the voters' list, psephologist Sanjay Kumar of the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies (CSDS) has apologised and deleted the posts, triggering a massive political row.
The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has accused the research body of putting out unverified data to help the Congress's "fake narrative".
The opposition Congress has responded, stating that while it used CSDS data, it has also corroborated its findings based on evidence collected separately.
In a surprise move, Sanjay Kumar deleted his tweets that alleged a sharp rise and fall in the number of voters in several Assembly constituencies in Maharashtra and apologised for the "error".
"I sincerely apologize for the tweets posted regarding Maharashtra elections. Error occurred while comparing data of 2024 LS and 2024 AS. The data in row was misread by our data team. The tweet has since been removed. I had no intention of dispersing any form of misinformation," he said in a post on X.
The very institution whose data Rahul Gandhi leaned on to defame the voters of Maharashtra has now admitted that its figures were wrong — not just on Maharashtra, but even on SIR.
— Amit Malviya (@amitmalviya) August 19, 2025
Where does this leave Rahul Gandhi and the Congress, which brazenly targeted the Election… pic.twitter.com/4o99YDvsMx
Sanjay Kumar had claimed that the number of voters in the Nashik West and Hingna Assembly segments rose by 47 percent and 43 percent, respectively, between the Lok Sabha election last year and the Maharashtra polls earlier this year.
He also claimed that the number of voters sharply fell in Ramtek and Devlali seats by 38 percent and 36 percent, respectively.
The claims provided fresh ammunition to Congress and helped with their 'vote fraud' charge against the BJP.
Top leaders of the Congress shared Kumar's post in an attempt to target the ruling party. However, with Sanjay Kumar now deleting his posts and apologising, the BJP has launched its counter strike.
Senior BJP leader and the party's IT head, Amit Malviya, said the institution Congress MP Rahul Gandhi relied on to make his allegations has now admitted that its figures were wrong.
"Where does this leave Rahul Gandhi and the Congress, which brazenly targeted the Election Commission and went so far as to brand genuine voters as fake? Shameful," Malviya said, demanding an apology from the Congress leader.
Sanjay Kumar's apology comes amid the Opposition's allegations against the Election Commission, which accused it of colluding with the ruling BJP to give the latter a poll advantage.
Presenting the Mahadevapura Assembly constituency in Karnataka as a case study, Gandhi has alleged 'vote theft' in polls.
The Congress leader said the Opposition sensed a problem during the Maharashtra election and then started a probe.
The INDIA bloc, which won 30 out of 48 Maharashtra seats in the Lok Sabha polls last year, could not even cross the 50 mark in the state polls just five months later.
The Election Commission had trashed these claims and asked Gandhi to either submit an affidavit to support its claims or apologise.
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