Punjab Congress president Navjot Singh Sidhu on Monday submitted a complaint to the Election Commission against the Aam Aadmi Party’s first-ever televote campaign — Janata Chunegi Apna CM — to name its chief ministerial candidate.

Rubbishing AAP supremo Arvind Kejriwal’s claim of having received 21 lakh responses in four days, Sidhu accused Delhi Chief Minister of scamming the people of Punjab with “fake” data, which is also “not mathematically logical”. Dubbing the entire televote campaign as “fake propaganda”, Sidhu dared Kejriwal to submit records which proved that AAP received so many responses to its opinion poll on selecting the party’s CM candidate.

Punjab Congress chief, in his complaint to the ECI, stated that prima facie, AAP’s survey seems to be “fake” as the data with respect to 21.59 lakh phone calls, voice messages, and WhatsApp messages within just four days is “not mathematically logical”.

“At the initial stage, this data pertaining to call logs is assumed to be fake,” Sidhu has written to the Chief Election Commissioner, demanding the registration of a case against AAP through its national convener and Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal if his charge is found to be true.

“A show-cause notice has been sent today. He (Kejriwal) is trying to fool the people of Punjab through his dirty tricks...AAP has created a hybrid model of fake news, said Sidhu.

On January 18, Kejriwal had named AAP’s Punjab unit president and two-time MP Bhagwant Mann as party’s chief ministerial face for Punjab polls after the televote campaign. “The party received 21.59 lakh responses from people during the drive to pick the CM face. Of them, 93.3 percent respondents took Bhagwant Mann’s name,” Kejriwal had said while announcing his name at an event in Mohali.

Sidhu, in his complaint, said that AAP was claiming that they have received seven lakh WhatsApp messages, 2.5 lakh voice messages, and eight lakh voice calls, but this does not make sense at all. “Usually, such calls take at least 15 seconds, then only 5,760 calls can be attended in one day and that shall add up to 23,040 calls in four days,” he said.

The Congress leader also requested the poll panel to direct the party to provide all call and message logs for verification.

Terming it a “deceptive drive”, Sidhu said that AAP had tried to fool people through this campaign. “Kejriwal deceived and scammed the people of Punjab...He launched a private number. He said 21.6 lakh messages and calls were received. It means every second 12 incoming phone calls were ringing day and night. Even if it is day and night, even then 5,760 calls or messages cannot be received. It is a deceptive scheme to deceive people. He is promoting this fake news. He is a masquerader,” he added.

Sidhu said: “When you are asking for AAP’s CM candidate’s name, why is Navjot Singh Sidhu’s name coming. It is impossible to get 22 lakh messages. If you get your maths right, then he was getting eight to 12 messages in a second and he was decoding it.”

“I challenge him to give us the record of 21 lakh calls. Just imagine how many people will be required to decode 21 lakh messages. Even computers cannot do it. These are slanderous lies. You will need at least Rs 25 to 40 crore, and many people to work constantly to decode it in four months...It is humanly impossible,” he said.

Punjab congress chief said that the previous time also, Kejriwal paid money to get surveys done. “People of Punjab are disillusioned. He creates a smokescreen. He should apologise to the voters of Punjab. He is a trickster and a scamster,” he added.

Hitting out at Kejriwal, Sidhu said tha AAP leader takes high moral ground, “but is actually a trickster, a hypocrite, and his move is nothing but a deceptive scheme to fool the people of Punjab”.