A day before the counting process for the 18th Lok Sabha starts, the Chief Election Commissioner (CEC) Rajiv Kumar on Monday (June 3) reacted to viral social media memes that referred to the three election commissioners as 'Laapataa Gentlemen', stating that, "We were always here, never went missing."

While addressing a press briefing, the Election Commission said “Social media meme pages are calling us ‘Laapataa Gentlemen'. But we were never laapataa (missing), we were always here.”

"Now memes can say the ‘Laapataa Gentlemen’ are back," he added, quoted The Times of India.

Kumar said over 68,000 monitoring teams and 1.5 crore polling and security personnel were involved in the world's largest electoral exercise. The CEC also noted that only 39 repolls took place in the 2024 general elections, compared to 540 repolls in 2019.

Kumar also said the EC will ensure that next general election concludes by the end of April, having learnt its lesson from the relentless heatwave that claimed the lives of 33 on-duty poll workers.

The CEC described the entire counting process as "absolutely robust," and claimed that all issues raised by multi-party delegations were addressed.

Kumar also alleged that there was a "fake narrative" of faulty voter lists and turnout data that was being peddled by some quarters.

"There is a pattern, there is a design... I won't say there is a toolkit. Neither did we delay the publication of voter turnout data data, nor did we alter the data. Still there is talk of irregularities in voter list or calls to 150 DMs and collectors. We need to fight the false narrative better," he said.