HYDERABAD: State BJP president N Ramchander Rao on Monday accused the Congress, BRS and AIMIM of “slinging mud” at the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls with ulterior political motives.
Addressing the media at the BJP office here, the former MLC clarified: “SIR is not a programme launched personally by Prime Minister Narendra Modi or the Union government. It’s a continuous, constitutionally mandated process conducted by the Election Commission of India.”
He wondered why objections were being raised now, when multiple SIRs were conducted by the Congress regime between 1951 and 2002 without any issues.
“As a responsible opposition, the BJP had welcomed the Election Commission’s decision at that time. But today, Congress and BRS are speaking in one voice to mislead the public through a conspiratorial campaign,” he said.
Referring to comments made by Chief Minister A Revanth Reddy, the BJP leader said that a man who was caught red-handed in the vote-for-note case has no moral right to speak about vote theft.
Asserting that the BJP will form the government in Telangana in the coming days, he alleged “this whole gang is spreading lies against the BJP out of fear of defeat”.
“It is laughable that some self-proclaimed intellectual Congress leaders are criticising the SIR, claiming that the BJP won in Bengal because of this process. Why didn’t they speak about SIR when the Congress-led UDF won Assembly polls in Kerala?” he asked, while emphasising that victories and defeats in politics are totally dependent on people’s mandate.
Ramchander Rao expressed grave concern that along the country’s borders in states like Bihar and West Bengal, as well as in the Hyderabad Old City, illegal infiltrators like Rohingya, Bangladeshis and Pakistanis are obtaining fake Aadhaar cards and ration cards with the support of certain local political parties to register as voters.
He stated that it has come to their notice that there are up to 200 bogus votes in a single house in the Old City. He questioned the Congress, BRS and MIM whether voting rights should be granted to the approximately 5,000 to 10,000 Pakistanis illegally overstaying in Hyderabad. He clarified that according to the Constitution of India, only an Indian citizen has the right to vote. Stating that the goal of SIR is to weed out fake votes, he added that none of the eligible citizens will lose their voting rights.