India

India Bloc Rally Draws Tens of Thousands to Demand Chief Election Commissioner’s Resignation

By Hemani Bhandari

By 11 a.m. on Sunday, the Inner Circle of Connaught Place was already crowded with people ahead of the “Chalo Dilli” protest scheduled for noon, which would march to Ramlila Maidan, about 2 km away. Participants included students, activists, political groups from across the country and ordinary citizens, all carrying placards and chanting slogans. 38‑year‑old Rakesh Solanki, who travelled from Badaun in Uttar Pradesh and is part of a group that calls itself the Cockroach Volunteers, told HT that they had stood their ground at every protest call, were beaten up and detained by police. The Congress‑led INDIA Bloc rally drew tens of thousands of people. Starting at 1:30 p.m. the crowd marched from Minto Road to Ramlila Maidan, chanting slogans against CEC Gyanesh Kumar. Local police officials estimate that more than 50,000 people were present, though no official attendance figures were released. The mood was not one of anger; many participants wore costumes and tribal workers performed cultural dances. A 21‑year‑old college student from Mumbai, who introduced himself as ‘Takshroach’, wore a full cockroach costume and said he had ordered the costume to get noticed and convey his message that faith in the electoral process must be restored. At A‑Block in the Inner Circle, Ramayan Singh Rathiya, a worker with the Chhattisgarh Adiwasi Congress, said his troop of about 200 people had come to represent their traditions and had been preparing for the dance for a week. A group from Gujarat, led by Sunil Chaudhary, performed a tribal music piece called Dovdu to bring attention to their identity and demand that those who have stolen votes be punished. Several participants spoke of overnight journeys and travel disruptions. Jagbir Singh, a farmer from Rohtak in Haryana, said his group left around 4 a.m. Sunday, were stopped at the Kundli border, and had to travel by car after buses were blocked. Around 500 women from the Mahila Congress in Chandrapur, Maharashtra, travelled to Delhi by train on October 30. 45‑year‑old Pramod Pandey, the organising secretary of the West Bengal Pradesh Congress Committee, wore a Batman mask and said his sister‑in‑law’s name had been deleted from the voter list. A group dressed in black wore garlands of cut fingers, symbolising people whose names have been deleted and stolen. Aditya, a participant, said the first step toward justice for them would be the CEC’s resignation and that the protesters carried a kilometre‑long list of deleted voters’ names. At 1:30 p.m., Rahul Gandhi and other Congress leaders, seated in an open mini‑van, reached the Minto Road–Connaught Place junction and headed to Ramlila Maidan as the crowds followed. They entered the Maidan around 3 p.m., where the crowd had been swelling all morning. Krishna Dubey, a joint secretary of the Chhattisgarh Pradesh Congress, said the rally was very successful, but they were leaving because there was no space to even stand. He added that Rahul Gandhi had shown the country his potential.