In Mumbai, opposition leaders Raj Thackeray and Uddhav Thackeray led a demonstration calling for the voter-roll revisions to be scrapped and for Kumar to step down, Reuters reported.
In New Delhi, protesters gathered in the evening as police detained some demonstrators . Police have detained dozens of people over the past three days and transported some away by bus after preventing protesters from assembling.
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Several demonstrators were later released, while police registered cases against some for allegedly violating orders restricting mass gatherings in the capital. Delhi Police have not provided details on the number or identities of those detained.
The protests center on a nationwide voter-roll revision exercise launched last year. Demonstrators allege that millions of eligible voters have been removed from electoral registers and claim the changes could benefit Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party.
The Election Commission and the BJP have rejected those allegations. The commission says the exercise is intended to remove duplicate, deceased and otherwise ineligible entries while protecting the integrity of the electoral system.
“The people of this country should decide who sits in power and who sits in opposition, not the Election Commission,” Raj Thackeray said during the Mumbai protest.
Opposition parties are expected to expand the demonstrations in the coming days. An alliance of opposition groups plans to hold a march to the Election Commission’s office in New Delhi on Monday under the slogan “save democracy.”
The Gen Z Cockroach Janta Party has also announced plans for a major rally in the capital on Oct. 10.
The demonstrations are the latest in a series of youth-led protests challenging Modi’s government. In July, student protests following the leak of question papers for a national medical entrance examination led to the removal of the federal education minister.
Kumar has not publicly responded to calls for his resignation or commented on the demonstrations.
On Friday, the Election Commission directed officials to register eligible voters who had been inadvertently left off electoral rolls.
