New Delhi (PTI): Alluding to Bollywood movies, the Congress stepped up its campaign against alleged "vote theft" on Saturday by releasing a new video titled "laapata vote" to highlight the claim.
Posting the video on X, former Congress president Rahul Gandhi said, "'Chori chori, chupke chupke' no more, the public has woken up." His party posted the video on its official social media account and said the "theft of your vote is theft of rights".
"Let's raise our voice against vote theft together and save our rights," the party said.
In the video, a man is seen pleading in the police station that his "vote has been stolen" and tells the officials there that "lakhs of votes are being stolen", leaving the police personnel wondering if their vote has also been "stolen".
The minute-long video is titled 'laapata vote' with 'ladies' cut out from between, a reference to the Kiran Rao-directed movie 'Laapata Ladies'.
The Congress released a video depicting how fake votes were being cast on Wednesday, too. Gandhi had shared that minute-long video and said, "Aapke vote ki chori aapke adhikar ki chori, aapki pehchaan ki chori hai (Theft of your vote is theft of your rights, theft of your identity)."
That video depicts a family entering a polling booth with two people telling them that their votes have already been cast, and it ends with the two persons casting fake votes, showing a thumbs up to an officer sitting at the table with an 'election chori aayog' display plate on his table.
The Congress has claimed that "vote chori" was a "do-or-die" issue for it, and announced a roadmap to take its allegations to the people through various activities.
The opposition party has also launched a web portal for people to register and demand accountability from the poll panel against what it called "vote chori", and express support for the demand for digital voter rolls.
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New Delhi (PTI): The BJP on Tuesday alleged that West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee's accepting Aroop Biswas' resignation as the state sports minister is nothing but a "rear-guard action" to douse public anger over the mismanagement of football icon Lionel Messi's event last week.
BJP co-in-charge for West Bengal Amit Malviya alleged that this is also an "open confession" that the Messi event fiasco was not accidental but a government-manufactured disaster, borne out of the poor governance of Banerjee, her ministers and the state bureaucracy.
Banerjee on Tuesday accepted Biswas' resignation as the sports minister in the wake of the controversy over the mismanagement of football icon Messi's event last week, a senior leader of the ruling TMC said.
Biswas, who had written to the chief minister seeking to be relieved of his responsibilities as sports minister, will continue as a cabinet minister, retaining charge of the power department.
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Reacting to the development, Malviya said in a post on X, "TMC Sports Minister Aroop Biswas resigns after the Messi fiasco and Mamata Banerjee accepts it in record time."
"Do not mistake this for accountability; this is nothing but a rear-guard action to douse public anger. anger! This is not 'Raj Dharma'," he added.
The BJP leader alleged that the incident was the outcome of "loot" of common people which is "so synonymous" with the TMC.
The incident was also the outcome of the "shameless VIP culture that TMC thrives on and deep-rooted cronyism promoted by Banerjee," he charged.
Malviya further alleged that Biswas' resignation exposes a "collective failure of Mamata Banerjee, her partisan bureaucracy, and her crony cabinet".
"This is a symbolic sacrifice, a political hoax, soon to be buried under layers of bureaucracy, with no justice, no accountability, and no remorse," the BJP leader said, adding, "No resignation will bring back the time lost, the money wasted, or the stolen chance for football lovers to witness Messi in Kolkata."
