Akhilesh Yadav attacks BJP and poll officials over affidavit scrutiny

Samajwadi Party president Akhilesh Yadav on Thursday accused the BJP and election authorities of trying to manipulate records, saying that out of 18,000 affidavits submitted by his party, only 14 had received what he called "half-baked and baseless" clarifications.

Yadav has been targeting the Election Commission over alleged voter list anomalies in the 2022 Uttar Pradesh Assembly polls, claiming the poll body and district magistrates are now in a confrontation over the issue.

District magistrates of Jaunpur, Kasganj and Barabanki have publicly refuted his charges of wrongful deletion of voters' names.


In a post on X titled "Haq ka Ganit: 18000-14 = 17986" (The arithmetic of rights), Yadav wrote, "Even after manipulating everything - from the Election Commission to district magistrates, from circle officers to lekhpals - the BJP-Election Commission-DM trio has managed to give clarifications on just 14 affidavits. Even if you subtract those 14, the count of 17,986 remains unanswered. This is the arithmetic of our rights."



"Neither suppression of rights nor suppression of votes will work this time. This time it will be our PDA government," he said referring to his campaign pitch for a PDA (Pichhda, Dalit, Alpsankhyak) government.

Yadav has repeatedly alleged that officials are working under pressure from the ruling BJP to obstruct the Samajwadi Party's electoral preparations, a charge the BJP has denied.

After Yadav's allegations of manipulation in 2022 assembly polls, district magistrates of some districts, including Barabanki, Jaunpur, Kasganj, have termed them as baseless.