INDIA bloc marches on Election Commission headquarters over Gyanesh Kumar row

Members of Parliament from the INDIA alliance marched to the Election Commission of India's headquarters, Nirvachan Sadan, on Tuesday, demanding the removal of chief election commissioner Gyanesh Kumar over alleged irregularities in poll body decisions. MPs gathered at the Makar Dwar of Parliament before setting off on the march, which marked the fifth successive day of protests against the election commissioner.

Authorities imposed traffic restrictions across large parts of central Delhi in anticipation of the demonstration, with vehicles being regulated and diverted around Connaught Place, Patel Chowk, Parliament Street, and the Patel Chowk-GPO stretch. Heavy security was deployed in the affected areas, prompting the opposition to question the scale of the response. "Why such security — we are unarmed," one opposition figure said.

The principal opposition party is also expected to reach out to parties outside the INDIA bloc, including the DMK and the Aam Aadmi Party, to broaden support for the protest movement. Separately, seventeen people arrested on charges of vandalism during an earlier anti-SIR protest in Delhi were granted bail. The unrest centres on what the opposition describes as irregularities linked to the Special Intensive Revision of electoral rolls, a process that has drawn sustained criticism from several political parties.