After 'vote chori' and 'sarkar chori' charges, Rahul accuses BJP of 'seat chori' in RS polls

Congress leader Rahul Gandhi on Thursday alleged that after “vote chori” and “sarkar chori”, the BJP has now indulged in “seat chori” in the Rajya Sabha elections, and the ruling party’s “jugalbandi” with the Election Commission has finished the contest even before it started. Gandhi’s attack came after the Election Commission (EC) rejected the nomination of Meenakshi Natarajan, the Congress Rajya Sabha candidate in Madhya Pradesh. “After 'vote chori' and 'sarkar chori', the BJP-EC jugalbandi has finished the contest before it has even begun with 'seat chori',” Gandhi said in a post on X. "Look at what happened in the Rajya Sabha elections. Congress candidate Meenakshi Natarajan ji submitted every document. No pending cases. The EC cancelled her nomination on BJP’s frivolous objection,” he claimed. Citing the case of Parimal Nathwani, the BJP-backed Independent Rajya Sabha nominee in Jharkhand, Gandhi said he got his own name wrong on the form and skipped multiple mandatory disclosures, “yet the EC gave him an extension to fix everything”. "Same Election Commission. Two candidates. One was disqualified without even a hearing. The other was rewarded despite not following the rules," the leader of opposition in Lok Sabha alleged. “When the Congress sought a meeting, the EC first tried to evade us. When we finally met, they did not say one word. Expect to see much more of this - because for the BJP, it is far easier to fix the election than to win it,” Gandhi said. The Congress first petitioned the EC, and after failing to get any respite, it moved the Supreme Court, which will hear the petition on Friday.