NEW DELHI, India — India’s opposition parties marched toward the Supreme Court in New Delhi on Monday to demand the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over alleged manipulation of voter rolls, as authorities closed metro stations and deployed thousands of security personnel for a third straight day, BBC News and Al Jazeera reported.
Opposition parties allege that voter-list revisions under Kumar favor Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party. The Election Commission and the BJP reject the charge. Congress leader Rahul Gandhi, the leader of the opposition in the lower house, called on “all opposition parties, civil society groups [and] all those who believe in democracy” to join the march.
“Bring as much police as you want — 10 thousand, 20 thousand, 40 thousand, go ahead,” Gandhi wrote on X in a post aimed at Home Minister Amit Shah, according to Al Jazeera. “We are not the ones to get scared. We are not the ones to back down. This fight is not going to stop now!” The BBC reported that thousands of people lined Barakhamba Road as a bus carrying Gandhi and other leaders arrived, and that Gandhi climbed onto the roof of the bus at Mandi House to wave to crowds.
The opposition had sought to hand a memorandum to Chief Justice Surya Kant, but he declined the meeting, citing “certain reasons,” and asked them to file a petition, which they said they would do at the end of the march. “Every Indian citizen has the right to approach the court, and we will hear their concerns and grant whatever is due under the law,” he told reporters, the BBC reported.
The march follows a weekend in which police detained thousands of supporters of the youth-led Cockroach Janta Party movement who tried to reach the Jantar Mantar protest site. Reporters Without Borders said at least 16 journalists were detained, and Communist Party of India (Marxist) lawmaker John Brittas said he was “manhandled, dragged, assaulted” by police. BJP President Nitin Nabin accused the opposition and the movement of trying to destabilize India “at the behest of foreign forces,” without saying who they were.
Sources: BBC News, Al Jazeera
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