New Delhi, June 8 -- The Congress's rivals lashed out on Saturday against the opposition leader Rahul Gandhi for alleging systematic rigging of the November 2024 Maharashtra elections, a claim also rebuffed by Election Commission officials who called it misinformation. The Leader of Opposition in Lok Sabha published an op-ed on Saturday, claiming the Maharashtra polls were a "blueprint for rigging democracy" and alleging "industrial-scale rigging involving the capture of our national institutions". Maharashtra deputy CM Eknath Shinde dismissed Gandhi's claims as baseless, pointing out the inconsistency in the Congress leader's position. "In the Lok Sabha elections, when Maha Vikas Aghadi won the elections in Maharashtra, they did not say anything. At that time, the EVMs and ECI were right," Shinde told reporters in Thane. BJP chief JP Nadda accused Gandhi of manufacturing "fake narratives" out of desperation following election defeats, saying the Congress leader was "cooking up bizarre conspiracies" and "defaming institutions with zero proof". Gandhi outlined what he termed a five-step rigging process: rigging the panel for appointing the EC, adding fake voters to electoral rolls, inflating voter turnout, targeting bogus voting where the BJP needed wins, and hiding evidence. Election Commission officials, who did not want to be named, reiterated their stance of following laid-down procedures as per law, dismissing allegations of voter percentage spikes and substantial jumps in elector numbers....