National Conference president Farooq Abdullah on Sunday challenged the claim that voters deleted during the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) of electoral rolls were infiltrators, asking whether Hindu voters removed in Uttar Pradesh were also “Pakistanis.” He made the remarks on November 1, 2026, while addressing an INDIA bloc rally at Ramlila Maidan in New Delhi.

Abdullah did not stop at the infiltrator argument. He turned it into a direct question for the Election Commission, one that he said the poll body has to answer.

The question that set the rally alight

Abdullah pointed to the reported deletion of over one crore Hindu voters in Uttar Pradesh. “Over one crore Hindus have been removed in U.P. Are they also Pakistanis? How long will you give this excuse?” he asked. He accused the poll body of “vote chori,” a phrase that translates roughly to vote theft, and put the claim squarely on the Election Commission.

The line was aimed at a specific argument. In recent weeks, the claim that deleted voters were infiltrators has been used to justify removals made during the SIR. Abdullah’s point was simple: if the deletions include Hindus in Uttar Pradesh, then the infiltrator explanation does not hold up on its face.

He also took aim at the political rhetoric behind the argument. Abdullah accused the BJP-RSS of repeatedly questioning the loyalty of Muslims by calling them Pakistanis. “They are pointing fingers at Muslims all the time, calling them Pakistanis,” he said. “I want to tell the BJP-RSS, we have given our blood for the country. We have to live in this country and strengthen it.”

Equal citizens, equal votes

Abdullah said people of any religion were Indians and would live and die as Indians. He grounded his argument in the Constitution, calling it Ambedkar’s Constitution and stressing that every citizen has equal voting rights.

“We have to ensure no Indian is denied the right to vote,” he said. He urged the crowd not to be afraid, telling them that the power rested with citizens and calling for unity to save the country.

Before ending his address with “Jai Hind,” he also asserted that Jammu and Kashmir was, and would remain, part of India. The statement came as the rally moved between questions about voter rolls and questions about the country’s direction.

Mehbooba Mufti’s warning on the Constitution

PDP president Mehbooba Mufti, who also addressed the rally, warned that the Constitution was being hollowed out. Her speech widened the charge beyond the voter rolls and into economic and constitutional territory.

She alleged that the Centre was transferring the country’s assets to a “corporate friend” while neglecting the poor. Land, she said, was being handed over to corporates at throwaway prices. She also said the government’s employment promises had not been fulfilled.

“They promised jobs, but even those who proudly joined the Army have been made daily wagers,” she said. Mufti framed the government’s record as a gap between promises and reality, one that she said ordinary people feel every day.

She then turned to the BJP’s claims of championing Hindutva. Referring to the alleged donation theft at the Ram temple in Ayodhya, she said, “They have stolen donations from the Ram temple. What can be a bigger shame?”

A warning drawn from Jammu and Kashmir

Mufti tied her warning to the events of 2019, when Article 370 was abrogated and the state was divided into two Union Territories. As a former Chief Minister, she said the people of the region had lived through the consequences of a hollowed-out Constitution.

“We, the people of Jammu and Kashmir, have been destroyed. They hollowed out the Constitution in 2019. But you should ensure they don’t make the whole country Jammu and Kashmir. We are with you,” she said.

She argued that the Constitution gave people the right to elect their representatives and change governments, and alleged that the government wanted to take that right away. Calling Jammu and Kashmir the soul of India, she closed with the line, “Sare jahan se achchha Hindustan hamara.”

Why the electoral rolls fight matters now

The two speeches, delivered at the same rally, pushed the SIR dispute from a technical argument about voter lists into a broader political confrontation. Abdullah questioned the logic of the infiltrator claim. Mufti questioned the health of the Constitution itself.

Both leaders framed their message around one idea: that every citizen’s vote must be protected. Abdullah asked the Election Commission to explain the deletions. Mufti asked the crowd to stop the slide before it became irreversible. “If you don’t change it now, it will be too late,” she said.

The rally put the INDIA bloc’s opposition to the government’s narrative on voter deletions on a national stage. For a country that depends on the credibility of its voter rolls, the questions now in circulation are not small ones. They go to whether the people being removed from the rolls are who the government says they are, and whether the body running the process will answer for it.