The third phase of Lok Sabha elections 2024 saw a voter turnout of about 68% on Tuesday (May 7). 93 Lok Sabha seats from 10 states and one Union Territory were contested. However, as is tradition with election season, a video related to voting is going viral on social media. It was claimed in the video that to avoid defeat, the ruling party, Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) is getting fake votes cast by the army. Tweets related to this claim are being shared by several verified and non-verified X users.
Claim: The Indian Army soldiers were persuading people to vote for BJP in the polling booth.
In the video, a man in a white shirt says, “They were asking people to press button number 1 to ensure BJP’s victory.” The man recording the video then said, “They were promoting the BJP inside the polling booth.” They also accused the soldiers of bringing people to cast proxy votes, adding that when the general public objected, they (the soldiers) had to run away.
An X user named Santosh Kumar Yadav wrote in his tweet with the video - Democracy is over, the dictator has stooped so low that army personnel were deployed to cast fake votes... fear of defeat!
According to Santosh's bio, he is associated with Samajwadi Party and is currently the National Coordinator of the social media cell of the party. More than 21k users follow Santosh on X.
At the same time, a verified user, Dr. Arunesh Kumar Yadav shared the viral video on X with the caption, ”…there is no need to say on whose instructions all this is happening, because votes are being cast in favor of BJP!! How much will the people of BJP lower the level of politics just to win one election? How much will you embarrass democracy? How much trouble will it cause to the general public?”
More than 31 thousand people follow Dr. Arunesh Kumar Yadav on X. According to the user's X bio, he is a Congress spokesperson and is currently the national media in-charge of the OBC department of the Congress.
Is the claim true?
The answer is no. During investigation, it came to light that this video is not from 2024 but is instead from 2019. During investigation, we found an ANI news report dated May 02, 2019 with the headline - 'Army officers claim miscreants obstructed from casting votes, lodge complaint'
The report said that some soldiers posted at Grenadiers Regimental Center along with their wives had come to Katanga, Jabalpur on 29 April 2019 to cast their votes. During this time, some unknown miscreants not only tried to snatch their voter ID cards but also stopped them from casting their vote. Later, a video of the soldiers was made viral on social media with false claims, with the intent to tarnish the image of the army.
Fact Check: The claim is false.
Here are the screenshots of the army's complaint:
Here is the viral video: