An investigation into the alleged attempt to delete 5,994 votes in the Aland assembly constituency of Karnataka’s Kalaburagi district has stalled, as the Election Commission (EC) has failed to provide crucial data necessary for completing the probe.

The controversy has intensified as the Congress accused the poll body of electoral roll manipulation.

The case, dating back to 2023 before the Karnataka state assembly elections, involves an alleged attempt to remove electors by forging Form 7 applications. The issue came to light when B.R. Patil, then a candidate in Aland and a senior Congress leader, was alerted to suspicious voter deletion applications. A complaint was promptly filed with the EC.

“One of the booth-level officers received a Form 7 application to delete her brother’s vote, when he had not even applied … The application was made in the name of another voter in the same village, who was also not aware of it. This tipped us off,” Patil, now the Aland MLA, told The Hindu.

Subsequent on-ground verification of 6,018 Form 7 applications in Aland revealed that only 24 were genuine, linked to voters who had indeed relocated. The remaining 5,994 voters were still residents and their names remained on the electoral roll, making them eligible to vote in the 2023 elections.

Despite the filing of FIR 26/2023 at the Aland police station for forgery, impersonation, and false documentation, the investigation has seen little progress.

The Hindu’s reporting included interviews with several constituents who had not applied for deletion from the voter list. In some cases, multiple applications to delete voters—many of whom were Congress members or supporters—were submitted in the name of a single person.

One affected individual explained, “There were nine applications made in my name to delete voters from part number 71, where I am also a voter … In all these applications, while my other credentials, including EPIC [elector photo ID card] number and photo are correct, phone numbers are different in each application. None of them belong to me.”

The Criminal Investigation Department (CID), conducting the probe, found evidence suggesting a well-orchestrated operation using the EC’s National Voter Service Portal, Voter Helpline app, and Garuda app.

However, when the CID requested “IP logs, date, time along with destination IPs and destination ports” to trace the devices behind the forged applications, the EC did not provide data regarding destination IPs and ports.

Over the past two and a half years, the CID reportedly sent 12 letters to Karnataka’s chief electoral officer seeking cooperation, according to the newspaper.

While the EC shared data on over 5,700 forged applications, information for around 1,300 remained incomplete. Nine mobile numbers used to create accounts on EC apps were traced, mostly to Maharashtra and Andhra Pradesh, but their owners—many digitally illiterate—denied any involvement, according to an unidentified senior official.

The investigation also raised serious questions about the security of the EC’s applications, particularly the OTP authentication process. The CID sought clarification on whether OTPs were sent to the applicant’s mobile number or the one listed in the form, but the poll body did not respond.

Patil, who won the 2023 election by a margin of 10,348 votes, told The Hindu, “If we had not made a big issue about these applications, the votes may have been deleted.”

He further claimed that most affected voters were Congress supporters. The case remains unresolved as the EC continues to withhold critical information.