PM should resign if EC says there are discrepancies in electoral rolls: TMC

Trinamool Congress MP Abhishek Banerjee on Tuesday said that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and his cabinet should resign and the Lok Sabha be dissolved if the Election Commission says there are discrepancies in the electoral rolls.

Banerjee, who is the national general secretary of TMC and considered the number two in the Mamata Banerjee-led party, said that the "EC cannot selectively say" that the voter list is fine in some states such as Gujarat, Uttar Pradesh, Madhya Pradesh, but not in West Bengal, Bihar or Tamil Nadu.

"If SIR (special intensive revision) of electoral rolls is conducted, it should be held across the country and the first step should be the resignation of the prime minister and his cabinet and the Lok Sabha has to be dissolved," he said. 

The TMC leader claimed that if the present government has been elected on the basis of the same voter list, then the legitimacy of the central government is null and void. Lok Sabha polls in the country were held in mid-2024.

"If the Election Commission is saying that there are discrepancies in the electoral rolls... the Lok Sabha should be dissolved and then SIR be held across the country," Banerjee told reporters at Netaji Subhas Chandra Bose International Airport here. 

Banerjee said that based on this voter list, the prime minister was elected and so were more than 240 Lok Sabha MPs of the BJP.

"The MPs elected on the basis of this voter list will also elect the country's President and the Vice-President," he said.

Banerjee alleged that the BJP has got the SIR done in Bihar since it knows they would lose the assembly elections in the state due later this year if people apply their voting rights.

"Rules cannot be different for different states, it should be the same for all states," he said, demanding that SIR be held in all states and not in some "selected states".