Right to vote is not privilege: MK Stalin urges President to remove Gyanesh Kumar

Stalin questioned the Election Commission's credibility over the alleged exclusion of genuine voters, demanding accountability for the SIR exercise and a thorough enquiry into the deletions.

DMK president MK Stalin on Wednesday urged President Droupadi Murmu to initiate steps to remove Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar from office, scrap the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls and restore ballot paper voting.

The former Tamil Nadu Chief Minister also urged the President to seek the Supreme Court's opinion on the legality of deleting 97.37 lakh names from the state's draft electoral rolls during the revision exercise.

Sharing details of his appeal to President on X, Stalin said the issues raised were "not mere questions" but "allegations that shake the very foundations of democracy".

He raised three questions: Why are 97 lakh voters missing from the electoral rolls? Did the deletion of voters change the election results? Where is the credibility of the Election Commission?

"The right to vote is not a privilege; it is a right guaranteed by the Constitution! Every vote must be counted. Every voter's right must be protected. We demand answers to our questions! We demand justice for democracy!" Stalin said.

In his memorandum, the DMK chief called for a Presidential reference to the Supreme Court under Article 143 of the Constitution to obtain an advisory opinion on the deletion of 97,37,832 voters who were left out of Tamil Nadu's draft electoral rolls following the SIR exercise.

Stalin also questioned whether the large-scale deletions had altered election results and raised concerns over the credibility of the Election Commission, demanding accountability for the revision exercise.

His latest memorandum comes amid the DMK's sustained opposition to the SIR exercise, which the party has alleged resulted in the exclusion of genuine voters from electoral rolls.

Earlier this month, a DMK parliamentary party meeting chaired by Stalin adopted four resolutions, including one demanding the immediate removal of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over the controversy surrounding the revision of electoral rolls.

The meeting alleged that the SIR process, carried out in Bihar, Tamil Nadu and several other states, was rushed and systematically disenfranchised genuine voters.

The DMK said it had consistently opposed the exercise since July 2025 through all-party meetings, legal challenges and statewide agitations. The party also accused the Election Commission of acting in a partisan manner and demanded a thorough enquiry into what it described as Kumar's unilateral decisions.

The meeting expressed support for ongoing youth and student movements protesting alleged electoral discrepancies. It also criticised the Congress and the Tamilaga Vettri Kazhagam (TVK), accusing them of political opportunism and maintaining a "silent, unholy nexus with the BJP".

At the meeting, the DMK had announced that its MPs would submit a formal memorandum to the President seeking the complete scrapping of the SIR process.

The party also called for a return to traditional ballot paper voting instead of Electronic Voting Machines (EVMs), arguing that the move would help restore public trust in the electoral process. It further demanded that 100 per cent of Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips be counted.