Maharashtra Deputy Chief Minister Ekanth Shinde has dismissed Congress leader Rahul Gandhi's fresh allegations of irregularities in the voters' list as "completely baseless" and challenged him to submit a formal affidavit to the Election Commission (EC), reported news agency PTI.

Gandhi on Thursday accused Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar of protecting those who "destroyed democracy" and cited data from a Karnataka assembly constituency to claim that votes of Congress supporters were being systematically deleted ahead of elections, reported PTI.