National Conference chief Farooq Abdullah slammed the alleged deletions by the Election Commission from the voter rolls amid protests against CEC Gyanesh Kumar over the SIR exercise, but said people have begun to show “courage”, indicating that “change” is on the way.

Speaking at the fifth ‘Halla Bolle’ conclave, the three-time former Jammu and Kashmir chief minister criticised the chief election commissioner and said that no one has the right to remove an Indian citizen from the voter list.

“Everyone knew how people’s names were struck off the voter rolls. And then they casually say, ‘Well, we’ll see about it in the next election.’ When the Constitution of India gives you the right, as an Indian citizen, to vote, no one has the right to remove anyone from the list,” he said. “Yet they did it”.

“They selectively targeted and struck off Muslims. Look at the extent of it, even an eminent lawyer like Kapil Sibal was removed from the list. How many were struck off. Because their objective is: ‘We have to stay in power until eternity, and to do that, we need people who will do our bidding’”. — PTI