Rajya Sabha member Kapil Sibal on Sunday skewered the BJP for striking at the “bedrock of democracy” through the “manipulation” of voter lists and urged Opposition parties to put up a united front against the special intensive revision of electoral rolls.

Speaking at an IUML event here, Sibal questioned the haste in conducting the SIR in Bihar ahead of the Assembly polls. “This is not going to end here. This battle has started in Bihar. It will reach every state of this country,” he said, urging the Congress, Trinamool and the IUML to stand up for democracy. “That is the only way this country will survive and we can end the vicious, toxic rule that we have suffered since 2014.”

Samajwadi Party and DMK leaders were also present at the event.

“The whole purpose of the SIR is to manipulate the voter lists, which is the bedrock of the Indian democratic system. If the voter lists are polluted, there can be no fair election,” Sibal said.

He attributed the alleged tampering of voter rolls to the BJP's fear of losing the next Lok Sabha elections. He claimed voters were added to the rolls to bring the BJP to power in Maharashtra, and they were being deleted in Bihar to ensure the party's win.