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They argue that electoral malpractice allegations must be backed by credible evidence, contrasting the present system with the bygone era of booth capturing.
A group of 124 former civil servants from the Indian Administrative Service (IAS), Indian Foreign Service (IFS) and allied services came together to issue an open letter to the citizens of India, defending the Election Commission of India (ECI) and the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls, questioning allegations of vote rigging that they said were being made without credible evidence.
In the letter dated October 10, the signatories said repeated use of the word “rigged” to describe elections without evidence risked undermining public confidence in democratic institutions.
The bureaucrats drew on their experience of conducting elections, preparing electoral rolls and supervising polling functions and argued that India’s electoral system had developed multiple safeguards against malpractice.
The former public servants contrasted the present system with an earlier period marked by booth capturing, ballot-box theft, electoral violence and voters being prevented from casting their ballots. They cited the 2025 Bihar Assembly elections, which they said were held without a single re-poll for the first time in the state’s history and recorded the highest voter turnout since 1951.
The letter listed safeguards including polling agents monitoring proceedings at booths, signed vote counts, sealing of electronic voting machines (EVMs), security at strong rooms and matching of Voter Verifiable Paper Audit Trail (VVPAT) slips with machine counts.
The signatories argued that large-scale rigging would require the complicity of thousands of officials and the agents of losing candidates, adding that no such conspiracy had been proved.
“A system cannot be honest when you win and rigged when you lose,” the letter said, pointing out that the party ruling at the Centre had lost several state elections under the same Election Commission and also lost its parliamentary majority in 2024.
Defending the Commission’s institutional structure, the officers highlighted its multi-member composition and said allegations of electoral malpractice should be supported by evidence.
“Questioning is every citizen’s right. Proving is the accuser’s duty,” they wrote, referring to legal avenues including objections to electoral rolls and election petitions before High Courts.
On the SIR exercise, the signatories said intensive revision was necessary to remove ineligible entries and improve the accuracy of electoral rolls.
Citing Bihar, they said officials had identified around 22 lakh deceased electors and seven lakh duplicate entries, while approximately 21.5 lakh new voters had been added.
The letter maintained that the process included safeguards such as notices, hearings, appeals and participation by political parties’ booth-level agents. It also cited Supreme Court directions requiring the publication of names excluded from the draft roll with reasons, accepting Aadhaar as proof of identity and providing legal aid for appeals.
According to the signatories, the Supreme Court upheld the Election Commission’s authority to conduct the SIR on May 27, 2026, while prescribing additional safeguards for voters wrongly excluded.
They said errors should be corrected but defended the exercise’s legitimacy.
The officers urged citizens to check their names on electoral rolls and help family members, neighbours and migrant workers do the same. They concluded by asking critics to distinguish between questioning electoral processes and making allegations without proof, warning that unsupported claims could erode trust in democratic institutions.