Dismissing criticism mounted by the opposition as well as civil society groups that the Election Commission did not act against top leaders of the ruling Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) including Prime Minister Narendra Modi over the party’s campaign that made headlines for its communal and divisive agenda, Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar said on Monday that the poll body took necessary action. He added that election commissioners were always present referring to viral memes on social media describing them as “Laapataa Gentlemen”.

Addressing the media a day before the results of the seven-phase Lok Sabha election are declared, Rajiv Kumar said, “Social media meme pages are calling us ‘Laapataa Gentlemen’. But we were never laapataa (missing), we were always here. We chose to interact with you through our press notes,” he said.

“This is for the first time we issued over 100 press notes, which has never been done. We have been interacting with you from behind the scene. So today we thought we will come and interact with you about the incredible story of the general elections and also try to answer whatever happened during the seven phases both positive and negative.”

This was the first press conference since March 16, when the Election Commission announced the schedule for the national election.

Kumar revealed that the commission had acted against Model Code violations by publishing “suo motu, a detailed report on the enforcement of the Model Code of Conduct”.

Kumar said that the commission addressed over 90% of 495 major complaints and notices were issued to “several top leaders, FIRs against many, and transfer of top officials to sanitise the election space”.

When asked about his learnings from the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, Kumar showed a slide saying “mischievous narrative” that said, “There was a mischievous narrative that we failed to understand. We stopped money, violence, misinformation, and violation of MCC. But we did not know about this and so we could not stop it. Let me show you a picture.”

Explaining that there was a pattern that “we could not understand”, Kumar said, “The pattern started with the allegation that before the election started that the voter list was faulty. The country should see this pattern. I had said on March 16 also that there is a market for lies. But we did not know that this would burst on our heads. Tell us where the voter list was faulty?”

“There may be some errors of 2-4% in some villages. But 95-98% there was no error. But no, let us try to light a fire. Then after elections started there were allegations of faulty EVMs. I am very serious about this. This could have spread anarchy in the country. Where political workers are charged, if they find out can you imagine the sentiments that can spread. This was a case from 2023 and the reply to that came four days before the first phase of elections. The same thing happened in 2019. Why wasn’t this raised between 2019-2024. I’m not saying it’s a toolkit. But there is a design. Let us understand this,” he said.

Clarifying on the Election Commission’s alleged delay in providing absolute numbers of voter turnout till the end of the first five phases, Kumar said that the figures were always available.

“There was no delay in voter turnout data. Assembly constituency (AC) wise and PC (parliamentary constituency) wise data was available at every moment. What was not available was the total of the PC and AC at the top of the voter turnout app. You have the total electors number, you have the percentage, so take out the total number if it is not there. But what was the atmosphere (mahaul) that was created? The voter list is faulty, the EVMs are faulty, there are no men at the table of the ARO (Assistant Returning Officer). What is this happening? This is a fake narrative that is being run and we were not prepared to understand this before. But now we have understood it,” he said.

On criticism that the election should be completed before the onset of summer, Kumar admitted polls should have been conducted at least a month earlier to avoid extreme heat.

“We could have done this earlier. Not in this heat,” he said.

Referring to Congress MP Jairam Ramesh’s allegation that Union Home Minister Amit Shah had been “calling” at least 150 DMs, Kumar said that evidence has to be provided to back such claims.

“An atmosphere (mahaul) was made that in large numbers RO’s were influenced. How can this happen in this country? Those who are working under such extreme heat in this country can they influence 500-600-900 people in this country? If they can tell us we will punish them. They should tell us who these DMs are. It cannot be that you spread such rumours and place seeds of doubts in everyone’s minds.”

Kumar confirmed acceptance of demands of the multiparty delegation, including CCTV monitoring, verification of slips and tags of EVMs.

The opposition had also demanded that the results of the postal ballots that are counted 30 minutes before EVMs be declared, to which Kumar said that the system cannot be changed.

Responding to a question regarding Gujarat’s Surat and the last-minute withdrawal of a Congress candidate in Madhya Pradesh’s Indore, who subsequently joined the BJP, Kumar said that his hands were tied.

“The legislative scheme is absolutely clear. If you want a fundamental conceptual answer, our effort is that there should be a contest everywhere. There is no doubt about that. But after nomination, if candidates withdraw what can we do? If they also are under pressure, if they have been kept shut somewhere that is a different matter. But if they withdraw on their own will what can we do?” he said.

India set a world record with 64.2 crore voters, including 31.2 crore women. Kumar said over 68,000 monitoring teams and 1.5 crore polling and security personnel were involved in the world’s largest election, noting that only 39 repolls took place this time, compared to 540 repolls in 2019.