Lucknow, Sep 5 (IANS) The Uttar Pradesh Chief Electoral Officer (CEO) on Friday once again rebutted Samajwadi Party President Akhilesh Yadav’s allegations about inaction over 18,000 affidavits filed against “wrong deletion” of voters’ names ahead of the 2022 Assembly elections.
In a post on X, the CEO said: “Till September 4, 2025, not even one affidavit out of the so-called 18,000 affidavits related to the complaint of wrong deletion of names of a large number of voters before the Assembly elections of the year 2022 has been received in original form by the District Election Officers of the concerned 33 districts and the Electoral Registration Officers of the concerned 74 assembly constituencies.”
“No affidavit has been received in original form in this regard in the office of the Chief Electoral Officer of Uttar Pradesh till September 4, 2025. As soon as the original affidavit related to this complaint is received, the investigation will be completed promptly and effective action will be taken and the general public will be informed,” said the CEO in a post, tagged to SP leader “@yadavakhilesh”.
The CEO also used the opportunity to clarify the difference between the office of the CEO – which conducts elections to Lok Sabha, Legislative Assembly and Legislative Council – and the State Election Commission (SEC), which conducts local body and panchayat elections.
Referring to reports that intentionally or unintentionally created an impression or linked the SEC to Assembly elections, the CEO said in the post: “Often there is no clarity about this among the general public and the media and people do not know the difference between the work of these two commissions. Even government officials and employees are often not aware of this difference.”
The post went on to clarify that reports in newspapers of Uttar Pradesh in the past few days about finding and correcting errors in voter lists through Artificial Intelligence (AI) were linked to the SEC that conducts elections of Panchayati Raj institutions and urban bodies.
“The news of correcting the voter list using AI is not related to the Election Commission of India,” said the CEO, Uttar Pradesh.
The latest social media post is not the first time that the CEO has refuted allegations related to inaction over the so-called 18,000 affidavits against wrong deletion of voters’ names from rolls – an issue repeatedly raised by the SP National President.
Last month, the CEO dismissed the Samajwadi Party’s claim about filing 18,000 affidavits of allegedly aggrieved electors as false, hinting at possible forgery in e-mailing of scanned copies of 3,919 affidavits by the party.
“Regarding the complaint made with 18,000 affidavits, which is being repeatedly mentioned, it is clarified that not a single voter’s affidavit has been received in its original form,” said the CEO in an earlier post on X.
The state’s top election official said: “Through email, the complaint filed by the Samajwadi Party has indeed resulted in the receipt of scanned copies of affidavits from approximately 3,919 different named individuals. The complaint pertains to 74 Assembly constituencies across 33 districts.”
“The investigation into the complaint related to 5 Assembly constituencies has been completed, and the findings of the investigation have also been presented to the general public through X,” said the CEO.
Cautioning that providing false evidence is a crime, the CEO said: “In the five Assembly constituencies investigated so far, it has been found that affidavits were created in November 2022 in the names of certain individuals who had died several years prior to 2022.”
“Some individuals, who were shown a scanned copy made in their name, have clearly refused that they ever provided such an affidavit. In is worth mentioning that, legally, providing false evidence is considered a crime,” said the CEO.
Earlier, the Samajwadi Party leader trained its guns on the Election Commission and, in a message on X, said: “The entire 2022 Assembly elections, all by-elections were looted under the collusion and signals of the BJP in power, and like Dhritarashtra, the Election Commission remained complicit in dishonest acts by silently supporting the BJP’s dishonesty.”
–IANS
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