Chief Justice Surya Kant did not grant the appointment request put forward by Lok Sabha Opposition Leader Rahul Gandhi and Rajya Sabha Opposition Leader Mallikarjun Kharge, the two having approached his office ahead of a Monday march to the Supreme Court that the INDIA bloc had organised around its stated concerns about electoral irregularities.

The pair had requested a meeting window of 4 pm to 5 pm on 12 October to hand over a memorandum that called for an end to what they described as electoral fraud, the removal of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar from his post, the suspension of the Special Intensive Revision (SIR) process for voter rolls, and a return to paper-based balloting.

An email exchange served as the channel through which the Chief Justice's reply reportedly reached both parties, based on information attributed to unnamed sources by a broadcast outlet. The delegation was told that the matters it had planned to raise were already under active consideration by the Supreme Court, rendering a formal meeting on those grounds unsuitable. Those same sources maintained that courts lack the authority to step into governmental operations by way of their administrative functions. Counsel was reportedly extended to the leaders, pointing them toward formal court proceedings as the appropriate avenue for asserting their constitutional rights.

Claims put forward by the Opposition revolve around two contentions: that qualified voters have been struck from electoral rolls without justification, and that the SIR process has been deployed as a tool to skew those lists. Opposition parties have pressed Kumar to account for what they characterise as favouritism shown by the Election Commission toward the BJP.

Divergent views within its deliberations are a normal part of the process, the Election Commission has argued, adding that its rulings rest on statutory authority and established legal procedures. Documented objections filed by Election Commissioners Sukhbir Singh Sandhu and Vivek Joshi — numbering at least 14 across a ten-month span, with a substantial portion tied to decisions around the SIR exercise — drew the dispute into sharper focus as those records became known.

A rally organised under the Congress banner — carrying the name "Chalo Delhi – March for Democracy" — is scheduled for Monday, with participants directed to gather at the Connaught Place–Barakhamba Road junction from 1.30 pm, the procession route running from there toward the Supreme Court. According to Gandhi, the march would draw participation from young people, opposition parties, and civil society organisations.

He further alleged that both police personnel and BJP-affiliated individuals had used force against demonstrators who gathered in Delhi that Saturday. According to Kharge, Opposition leaders were seeking an audience with the Chief Justice to request involvement in the matter. Citing the arrests and visible police deployment that took place during Saturday's gathering, he argued that Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Union Home Minister Amit Shah had a hand in fuelling the disorder, and that the breadth of the security mobilisation reflected an unease within the administration over the demonstrations.

On Friday, lawmakers from the Opposition found their path blocked at Vijay Chowk in New Delhi, a standoff with police that forms part of the sequence of events surrounding the dispute. A ten-member Opposition group travelled to Rashtrapati Bhavan to place before President Droupadi Murmu their call for Kumar's removal, while a number of MPs held a sit-in protest at the same time.

Following their meeting with the President, opposition leaders told reporters that Murmu had requested documentary proof of the contested voting irregularities and was prepared to look into the grievances they had raised. Gandhi expressed dismay in the aftermath, telling reporters that the President's failure to address or contest the allegations left him taken aback. The Opposition, he stated, would deliver to the President a body of documentation that he described as proof of electoral irregularities already widely known throughout the country.

A planned rally to the Supreme Court forms one strand of the opposition's broader push for reforms to how electoral rolls are revised, greater openness in the preparation of voter lists, and the removal of the Chief Election Commissioner from office. Dispute over those claims persists, with the Election Commission holding that its conduct falls within the bounds of the law as written.