Old & Unrelated Video Shared as Voting Fraud During Karnataka Elections

Fact-Check | The video is old and unrelated to the 2023 Karnataka Elections.

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

A video that shows a man continuously casting votes on the Electronic Voting Machine (EVM) is being circulated on the internet, with users claiming that it happened during the voting day of the 2023 Karnataka assembly elections.

An archive of the post can be seen here.

(Source: Twitter/Screenshot)

(More archives of similar claims can be seen here, here, and here.)

What is the truth?: Neither is the video recent, nor is it from Karnataka. The video dates back to February 2022 and was reportedly taken during the municipal elections in West Bengal.

How did we find out?: A reverse image search led us to the same visuals uploaded on the YouTube channel of TV9 Bangla.

• The video was uploaded on 27 February 2022.

• It was titled, "WB Municipal Election 2022 | In booth No. 108 of Ward No. 33 of South Dumdum, the voter did not vote, the agent voted (sic)."

Opposition parties tweet visuals: The Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Congress party had posted similar visuals on their Twitter handle and criticised the Trinamool Congress (TMC) for endangering democracy.

A second wind?: The Quint had previously debunked the same video when it was shared as an incident of voting fraud in Gujarat, where users were blaming the BJP for it. You can read our fact-check here.

A barrage of misinformation: After Congress' win in the Karnataka elections, several old and unrelated videos have been shared with false claims, including communally charged ones. You can read our stories here and here.

Conclusion: An old and unrelated video is being shared on social media platforms to falsely claim that it shows voting fraud during the Karnataka assembly elections.

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