Day After His Apology, Police Case Against Psephologist Over Maharashtra Data

A police case has been filed against Sanjay Kumar, an official from the Centre for the Study of Developing Societies or CSDS, over his controversial social media posts related to Maharashtra elections. The move by the Nagpur police came a day after the psephologist apologized for his post and explained how the error had crept in, sparking another massive political row. 

The case against him has been filed under multiple sections of the Bharat Nyaya Samhita -- the charges are linked to false information and potential election-related violations.

"Sanjay Kumar from CSDS, has posted misleading information of voters of 126-Devlali AC for LS-2024 and MH LA-2024, case is registered against him. It is requested to all citizens to verify the info only from ECI website," read a post on X from the District Election Office of Nashik. 

@CEO_Maharashtra @ECISVEEP @SpokespersonECI
Sanjay Kumar from CSDS, has posted misleading information of voters of 126-Devlali AC for LS-2024 and MH LA-2024, case is registered against him. It is requested to all citizens to verify the info only from ECI website

— DEO Nashik (@Deonashik) August 20, 2025

Earlier, in a post, Mr Kumar had flagged significant voter additions and deletions in the Maharashtra Assembly election, which had added to the Congress "Vote theft" allegations against the BJP and the Election Commission.

Read: BJP Targets Congress's 'Vote Chori' Campaign After Psephologist's Apology

On August 17, the psephologist had claimed that the number of voters in the Nashik West and Hingna Assembly segments rose by 47 per cent and 43 per cent between the Lok Sabha election and the Maharashtra polls. He also claimed -the number of voters sharply fell in Ramtek and Devlali seats by 38 per cent and 36 per cent.

But two days later, he posted on X, "I sincerely apologize for the tweets posted regarding Maharashtra elections. Error occurred while comparing data of 2024 LS and 2024 AS. The data in row was misread by our data team. The tweet has since been removed. I had no intention of dispersing any form of misinformation".

I sincerely apologize for the tweets posted regarding Maharashtra elections.
Error occurred while comparing data of 2024 LS and 2024 AS. The data in row was misread by our Data team.
The tweet has since been removed.
I had no intention of dispersing any form of misinformation.

— Sanjay Kumar (@sanjaycsds) August 19, 2025

It provided ammunition to the BJP, which accused the research body CSDS of providing erroneous data to back Congress allegations. The Congress responded that they had independently verified CSDS data before using it.