Chief Justice of India Surya Kant has rejected opposition leaders’ request for a meeting to discuss alleged electoral malpractice, saying the issues they wanted to raise were already before the Supreme Court, The Times of India reports.
Congress president Mallikarjun Kharge and Rahul Gandhi, the Leader of the Opposition in the Lok Sabha, had sought an appointment between 4pm and 5pm local time on Monday to submit a memorandum over what they call “vote chori”, or vote theft.
According to The Times of India, the chief justice explained his decision in an email to the opposition leaders.
The request followed a meeting between INDIA bloc representatives and President Droupadi Murmu on Friday, during which they submitted a memorandum outlining their demands.
The opposition’s demands included the resignation of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar, scrapping assembly elections held over the previous two years, suspending the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls and restoring paper ballots.
The memorandum also called for the reinstatement of 133 million voters allegedly removed from electoral lists, the Indian newspaper reported.
Gandhi had also announced plans for opposition parties, civil society groups and young people to march to the Supreme Court, seeking action over the alleged irregularities.
After meeting Murmu, Gandhi said he was surprised that she had not rejected the opposition’s allegations and had instead asked for evidence. “We will bring her a mountain of it,” he wrote on X, referenced in the report.
The BJP accused Gandhi of misrepresenting the meeting and politicising the president’s role.
Party spokesperson Sambit Patra said accepting a memorandum did not mean endorsing its contents, while BJP MP Ravi Shankar Prasad criticised the opposition’s street protests and said the country should be governed through parliament.
The INDIA bloc’s latest protests began on Tuesday, when opposition lawmakers marched from Parliament towards the Election Commission but were stopped.
Rahul Gandhi later staged an eight-hour sit-in at the Akashvani Bhawan complex, The Telegraph India said.
More than 7,000 people were detained during Saturday’s New Delhi protest demanding Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar’s resignation,
The Times of India reported, as the INDIA bloc continued its campaign over voter-list revisions and the Election Commission’s role.