The Video of EVMs in a School Bus? It’s from 2018 MP Elections
The video is viral with the message that this is how the BJP and Amit Shah are planning to win this election.
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CLAIM
A video of an unregistered school bus carrying EVMs is going viral on social media, with the message that this is how the BJP and Amit Shah are “planning to win this election”.
In the three-minute video, a yellow school bus – without any number plates – is seen parked somewhere, with a large number of people standing around it. The person with the camera enters the bus, showing that there is a large number of EVMs kept in the bus.
The video is being shared on WhatsApp with the narrative that this is how the BJP are distributing EVMs all over the country. Here is the message that accompanies the video:
The message is: “मोदी, शाह, भाजपा एवं चुनाव आयोग के मिलीभगत का भंडाफोड़
मध्य प्रदेश में आज एक बीना नंबर के स्कूल गाड़ी और 3 बलेरो से सैकड़ो EVM मशीन Strong room में रखते पकड़े गए
तभी तो अमित शाह इतने Confidence से हर चुनाव में पहले ही कह देते हम जीतेंगे”
(Translation: Exposing the collusion of Modi, Shah, BJP and EC
Today, in Madhya Pradesh, a school bus without a number and three Boleros were being used to transport hundreds of EVM machines to the strong room. This is how Amit Shah is able to say, with so much confidence in every election, that they will win.)
The video is also viral on Facebook and is being shared by a large number of people with the same message.
TRUE OR FALSE?
While the incident actually did take place, it happened in November 2018, after the Madhya Pradesh elections, in the state’s Sagar district. The video was released then and a huge controversy had broken out over it. Many news outlets carried the report about it and it was claimed then that the school bus had reached the Sagar district Collector’s office 48 hours after polling.
NDTV carried a report on 1 December 2018 about the incident. The news video carried in the report shows the same visuals as in the viral video, but gives the correct context, that this happened 48 hours after the elections.
In the photo shared below, the EVMs can also be seen:
The Hindu also reported the same incident.
The Madhya Pradesh Congress Twitter handle also reacted to the incident on 30 November 2018, with photos, questioning whether this was a conspiracy by the government to ensure a BJP win.
The Congress had alleged EVM-tampering for this and some other incidents. The party’s Rajya Sabha member Vivek Tankha had told reporters, “The objective of this was ostensibly to deposit these machines with the office of the Collector. These spare EVMs were to be deposited two hours after the polls and not after two days. This happened in the Khuria seat from where the State Home Minister is contesting the polls.”
However, the chief electoral commissioner of Madhya Pradesh said that the EVMs in the bus were kept as ‘reserve’.
"Every EVM has a unique number code for it. The numbers of EVM used in polling have been shared with all political parties. The numbers of reserved EVM's have been checked by political parties in sagar districts. Their numbers are different," the chief electoral officer said, reported NDTV.
Therefore, the video doing the rounds now on WhatsApp is old and is being made to appear recent.
(With inputs from The Hindu and NDTV.)
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