Opposition Bloc Rallies at Ramlila Maidan, Demanding Election Chief Step Down
Thousands gathered in New Delhi after police removed Jantar Mantar from the list of approved protest sites.
By Aiko Sato ·
NEW DELHI: Opposition parties in India held a new round of protests on Sunday, Nov. 1, calling for the resignation of the country's chief election commissioner. The rally drew thousands of people to Ramlila Maidan, a large public ground in New Delhi.
The demonstration was organized by the INDIA alliance, formed in 2023 to challenge Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Several parties in the coalition dispatched activists from multiple states. Some demonstrators carried musical instruments and waved flags while chanting against the central government's policies.
Rahul Gandhi, leader of the Congress party, the main opposition group, led the march alongside the youth movement Cucaracha. Protesters called for the resignation of chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over a disputed revision of voter rolls. Police removed Jantar Mantar, long the capital's main protest site, from the list of officially designated demonstration grounds last month, prompting organizers to move to Ramlila Maidan.
Authorities stationed thousands of police and paramilitary soldiers at the site. Officials said the security operation included more than 200 security cameras, drones and body-worn cameras deployed at the gathering and along the march route.
The ongoing review of voter lists has struck more than 130 million names from the rolls since last year. Critics say the process carries political motives, risks disenfranchising millions more, and has disproportionately affected minorities, particularly Muslims. The Election Commission and Modi's government reject those claims and say the review removes duplicate and ineligible records.
Human Rights Watch said on Thursday that allegations about the voter roll revision raise "serious questions about the impartiality of future elections in India." Elaine Pearson, the group's Asia director, said in a statement that authorities should "immediately end the voter roll review process that has denied India's most marginalized people their right to vote and other government services."
The demand for Kumar's ouster has circulated for weeks among opposition parties and supporters of the Janata Cucaracha Party as they challenge Modi's nationalist Bharatiya Janata Party. Modi has not spoken publicly about the protests. Some leaders in his party have called protesters "anarchists" and suggested, without offering evidence, that they have backing from foreign powers.
Protests led by the Cucaracha youth movement forced the resignation of Modi's education minister in July, a rare setback for a leader who has held power for more than 12 years. The movement began as a satirical online campaign this past summer after India's chief justice compared unemployed young people to insects.
