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Karnataka Congress puts 13 questions to ECI over bulk Form 7 filings; Kharge demands scrapping of SIR

Kharge called for a criminal inquiry into bulk Form 7 filings and FIRs against those who generated, filed or coordinated fraudulent Form 7 applications.

South First Desk

Published Oct 01, 2026 | 9:13 PM ⚊ Updated Oct 01, 2026 | 9:13 PM

Picture with a logo of Election Commission of India

The party put forth a dozen questions to the poll body after reports of bulk Form 7 filings in several constituencies across the State.

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Synopsis: The Karnataka Congress has put forth a dozen questions to the ECI, demanding to know how detailed voter information, including names, addresses and EPIC numbers, came to be used in large numbers of Form 7 applications seeking the deletion of voters from the electoral rolls during the ongoing SIR in the State. Home Minister Priyank Kharge alleged that a pattern was emerging from the reports, suggesting that it was “electoral fraud hatched by the BJP-JD(S)-ECI nexus to drop nearly 60 lakh voters from the electoral rolls in Karnataka.”

The Karnataka Congress has demanded answers from the Election Commission of India on how detailed voter information, including names, addresses and EPIC numbers, came to be used in large numbers of Form 7 applications seeking deletion of voters from the electoral rolls during the ongoing Special Intensive Revision (SIR) in the State.

The party put forth a dozen questions to the poll body after reports of bulk Form 7 filings in several constituencies across the State. Earlier the same day, Chief Minister DK Shivakumar led a sit-in at the State Election Commission office in Bengaluru and submitted a representation to Chief Electoral Officer Anbukumar, seeking an FIR and a time-bound investigation into the reports.

Home Minister Priyank Kharge, who, along with his Cabinet colleagues and Congress MLAs, was present at the sit-in, said a pattern was emerging from the reports, suggesting that it was “electoral fraud hatched by the BJP-JD(S)-ECI nexus to drop nearly 60 lakh voters from the electoral rolls in Karnataka.”

He added that the pattern followed many other “dirty tricks in the BJP-ECI VoteChori playbook” that had previously been raised by the Congress in the Mahadevapura and Aland constituencies.

“Thousands of Form 7 applications have been filed in each Assembly constituency, mostly by a handful of suspected individuals with BJP ties,” Kharge said in a post on X.

“In some cases, BLOs were pressured into signing bulk Form 7s, people were impersonating the ERO to push the approvals through, and the ERO himself was unaware that his name was being used.”

Kharge demanded that the SIR be scrapped in Karnataka and called for a criminal inquiry into bulk Form 7 filings and FIRs against those who generated, filed or coordinated fraudulent Form 7 applications. He also demanded that the authorities identify who supplied the voter data used in the pre-filled forms, trace the individuals and political actors behind the filings, restore every eligible voter wrongly targeted or deleted, protect minority, backward-class, SC and ST voters from wrongful exclusion, and direct BLOs, BLAs, DCs, ACs, EROs and Tahsildars to immediately report suspicious Form 7 activity.

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Congress’ 13 questions to the ECI

The Congress has sought answers to the following questions:

  • How did the individuals submitting Form 7 applications obtain detailed voter information, including names, addresses and EPIC numbers, if such information was not legitimately available to them?
  • How did printed Form 7 applications containing detailed voter particulars reach individuals who were not the concerned voters? Who generated, printed and distributed these forms?
  • How were EPIC numbers of large numbers of voters accessed? Does the Election Commission suspect that voter data from its database may have been accessed, copied or leaked?
  • How could a single individual submit more than 100 Form 7 applications seeking deletion of voters’ names? What verification mechanism allowed such a large number of applications to be submitted by one person?
  • Were the Form 7 applications submitted physically or electronically, and what records are available regarding the IP addresses, devices, login credentials, locations and timestamps associated with their submission?
  • Did the Election Commission identify any unusual pattern in the Form 7 applications, such as multiple applications originating from the same person, address, device, phone number, IP address or other common source? If so, what action was taken?
  • Is it not evident that Form 7 applications may have been filed by impersonation, with applications submitted in the names of individuals who were completely unaware that such applications had been filed seeking deletion of their names from the electoral rolls?
  • Were the voters whose names were sought to be deleted independently contacted or verified before the applications were processed? If not, why was additional verification not triggered when large numbers of applications were submitted?
  • Has the Election Commission conducted a forensic audit of its voter database and Form 7 application records to determine whether voter data was accessed by unauthorised persons or organisations?
  • Prima facie, does this not appear to be an organised effort to manipulate the voters’ list? If so, will the Election Commission investigate whether there was a coordinated effort to identify specific voters and submit Form 7 applications seeking their deletion?
  • During the SIR exercise, what safeguards were put in place to prevent the voter database, EPIC numbers and other electoral information from being misused for mass deletion attempts? Were any of these safeguards breached in the cases now under scrutiny?
  • If the Form 7 applications were genuine, why were they subsequently withdrawn? Does the withdrawal of a large number of such applications not warrant an investigation into why they were filed in the first place, who instructed or facilitated their filing, and why the applicants later sought their withdrawal?
  • Lastly, why have suo motu cases not been registered and taken up by the Election Commission despite multiple incidents involving the submission of Form 7 applications in large numbers to seek the deletion of voters’ names? When there are repeated instances of such applications being filed, does the Election Commission not have a duty to independently examine the pattern and initiate action wherever prima facie violations are found?

(Edited by Dese Gowda)

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