Still smarting from his party's humiliating loss in November last year, Shiv Sena (Uddhav Balasaheb Thackeray) leader and Rajya Sabha MP Sanjay Raut has alleged that a "Maharashtra pattern" of voter list fraud has been repeated in Delhi, where the BJP has pulled off a spectacular victory.
Mr Raut had been critical of the Election Commission of India after the Maharashtra elections, in which his party, which was in an alliance with the Congress and the Sharad Pawar faction of the NCP, won only 20 of the state's 288 Assembly seats. Doubling down on his criticism after leads showed the BJP comfortably ahead, Mr Raut claimed that the commission had been turning a blind eye to serious concerns.
"We held a press conference to discuss the attitude of the Election Commission and the government regarding the elections. How a fraud is happening in the voter list and how this new Maharashtra pattern has been created. I also said that the Maharashtra pattern has been implemented in Delhi as well," the Shiv Sena (UBT) leader said.
"The Election Commission was sitting with its eyes closed. The 39 lakh votes that have increased in Maharashtra in five months will now shift to Bihar, some will go to Delhi... You think people are voting for BJP, nobody wants to vote for BJP, this is forced voting," he claimed.
Mr Raut also said the outcome would have been different if the Congress and the AAP, its allies in the opposition INDIA bloc, had decided to contest the Delhi Assembly elections together.
"The early trends show a sharp competition. Had Congress and AAP been together, the results may have been different. The political opponent of AAP and Congress is BJP. Both of them fought to keep BJP from coming to power, but they fought separately. If they had been together then BJP's defeat would have been confirmed in the first hour (of counting)," he emphasised.
Jammu and Kashmir Chief Minister, a leader from the National Conference which is also an INDIA constituent, was much more vocal.
Mr Abdullah posted a GIF - apparently directed at the Congress, AAP and the larger INDIA bloc - that said "aur lado, jee bhar ke lado, samapt kar do ek dusre ko" (fight some more, fight to your heart's content, finish each other off). In his text with the GIF, Mr Abdullah underlined the message, writing: "aur lado aapas mein" (fight each other some more).
(With inputs from ANI)
