New Delhi: While opposition party leaders are attacking the Election Commission and the BJP over the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of the voter list in Bihar and alleged ‘vote theft’, now BJP IT cell chief Amit Malviya hit back and made a big claim on Wednesday. He said that Congress leader Sonia Gandhi had become a voter here even before becoming an Indian citizen.
Amit Malviya claimed in a post on social media platform X, “Sonia Gandhi’s relationship with the voter list of India is full of gross violations of electoral laws. Perhaps this is the reason why Rahul Gandhi is in favor of regularizing ineligible and illegal voters and opposes SIR.”
According to Malviya, “Sonia Gandhi’s name was first added to the voter list in 1980, while at that time she had Italian citizenship and was not a citizen of India. At that time, the Gandhi family lived at 1, Safdarjung Road, the official residence of Prime Minister Indira Gandhi. Till that time, the registered voters at that address were Indira Gandhi, Rajiv Gandhi, Sanjay Gandhi and Maneka Gandhi.”
He said the voter list of New Delhi parliamentary constituency was revised with January 1, 1980 as the eligibility date. During this revision, Sonia Gandhi’s name was added at serial number 388 of polling station 145.
“This entry is a clear violation of the law that makes Indian citizenship mandatory for voter registration. After massive protests in 1982, her name was deleted, but it was added again in 1983,” Malviya alleged.
Malviya said that in the fresh revision that year, Sonia Gandhi’s name was entered at serial number 236 in polling station 140 with January 1, 1983 as the eligibility date, even though she got Indian citizenship only on April 30, 1983.
He said, “Sonia Gandhi’s name appeared twice in the voter list without fulfilling the basic citizenship requirement, first in 1980 as an Italian citizen and then in 1983 a few months before she legally became an Indian citizen.”
Malviya also questioned why it took her 15 years to accept Indian citizenship after marrying Rajiv Gandhi. He shared an excerpt of the 1980 voter list with his post and asked, “If this is not gross electoral malpractice, then what it is?”
