Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar Refutes “Laapata Gentlemen” Label, Asserts Active Presence During Elections
New Delhi, 3rd June 2024: Chief Election Commissioner Rajiv Kumar addressed concerns regarding social media memes dubbing election commissioners as “Laapataa Gentlemen,” emphasizing their consistent presence during the electoral process. Kumar debunked the notion of their absence, asserting, “We were never missing, we were always here.”
Reflecting on the recently concluded Lok Sabha election, Kumar highlighted India’s world record-breaking voter turnout of 64.2 crore, inclusive of 31.2 crore women voters. He commended the involvement of over 68,000 monitoring teams and 1.5 crore polling and security personnel in facilitating the mammoth electoral exercise, noting a significant decrease in repolls from previous elections.
Kumar assured that future general elections would conclude by the end of April, considering lessons learned from the tragic loss of 33 poll workers due to a relentless heatwave. He affirmed the integrity of the counting process, addressing concerns raised by multi-party delegations and emphasizing post-election scrutiny.
While acknowledging the system’s allowance for post-election scrutiny, Kumar cautioned against the dissemination of a “fake narrative” regarding faulty voter lists and turnout data. He urged for a concerted effort to combat misinformation, citing successful disposal of Model Code of Conduct violation complaints and the EC’s control over deep fakes and AI-generated synthetic content during the election.
