{"id":2445,"date":"2026-10-10T14:03:57","date_gmt":"2026-10-10T09:03:57","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=2445"},"modified":"2026-10-10T14:03:57","modified_gmt":"2026-10-10T09:03:57","slug":"pressure-mounts-on-india-poll-chief-over-voter-list-changes","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/?p=2445","title":{"rendered":"Pressure mounts on India poll chief over voter list changes"},"content":{"rendered":"
\n

India\u2019s \u201cCockroach\u201d youth movement and opposition parties are pushing hard for election chief Gyanesh \u200cKumar to resign over accusations of widespread manipulation of voter lists<\/a> during an exercise to verify one billion voters.<\/strong><\/p>\n

The calls come a month after US President Donald Trump praised the former bureaucrat, who took over as India\u2019s chief election commissioner in February 2025, for insisting that voters prove \u200btheir identity with photo ID, unlike in the US.<\/p>\n

Criticism of Kumar, who has denied all accusations, soared \u200blast month after a report in the Indian Express<\/em> newspaper.<\/p>\n

The paper said his two deputies had \u2060raised at least 14 formal objections over 10 months to decisions regarding voter rolls, registration procedures and the poll \u200bbody\u2019s digital systems.<\/p>\n

Election Commission data shows that more than 130 million names, a figure exceeding the population of Japan, have \u200bbeen struck off the voter list since the latest round of revisions began last year.<\/p>\n

Nearly 650 million people of the 960 million registered voters voted in the last general election in 2024.<\/p>\n

The opposition has long claimed that the government is trying to fix voter lists to \u200bits advantage and was quick to repeat the accusations after the Indian Express<\/em> report.<\/p>\n

Government ministers, Prime Minister Narendra Modi\u2019s Bharatiya \u200bJanata Party and the poll body have all denied the charges.<\/p>\n

Kumar, 62, and the two other election commissioners have not commented, but \u200cthe \u2060Election Commission said, \u201cDiffering views and observations are a normal part of deliberation in any institution\u201d.<\/p>\n

<\/a>Protest threat<\/strong><\/h3>\n

The youth-led Cockroach Janta Party has called a protest in New Delhi<\/a> on Saturday to demand Kumar\u2019s resignation, and the main opposition alliance led by the Congress party has also staged protests this week calling for him to step down.<\/p>\n

Kumar has defended the actions of the \u200bpoll body and told a \u200bpress conference last year: \u201cFor the \u2060Election Commission, there is neither an opposition nor a ruling side; everyone is equal.\u201d<\/p>\n

When Trump praised him, Kumar was riding high in sections of the Indian media last month.<\/p>\n

But \u200bsince the Indian Express<\/em> report, graffiti have appeared near his ancestral home in northern \u200bIndia calling him \u2060a traitor.<\/p>\n

Kumar joined the Indian Administrative Service in 1988 after completing his B.Tech<\/a> in civil engineering from an elite government college in his northern home state of Uttar Pradesh.<\/p>\n

He previously worked in the defence and home ministries, and retired in January \u20602024. Two \u200bmonths later, he was appointed an election commissioner, before eventually becoming the chief.<\/p>\n

Kumar \u200bhas had a troubled relationship with opposition parties from the start of his tenure as chief.<\/p>\n

Opposition lawmakers presented a motion in parliament for his \u200bremoval this year, but it was rejected.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

India\u2019s \u201cCockroach\u201d youth movement and opposition parties are pushing hard for election chief Gyanesh \u200cKumar to resign over accusations of widespread manipulation of voter lists during an exercise to verify one billion voters. The calls come a month after US President Donald Trump praised the former bureaucrat, who took over as India\u2019s chief election commissioner in February 2025, for insisting that voters prove \u200btheir identity with photo ID, unlike in the US. Criticism of Kumar, who has denied all accusations, soared \u200blast month after a report in the Indian Express…<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[19],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-2445","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-english"],"gutentor_comment":0,"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2445","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=2445"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/2445\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=2445"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=2445"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/ipp-news.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=2445"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}