As Gujarat gears up for the much-awaited assembly elections, a fake image has gone viral on social media that predicts a big win for the Congress.
The image is a photoshopped screenshot from an ABP News show, which was aired on 31 August 2017, and discussed an opinion poll conducted by Lokniti-CSDS for the Gujarat elections.
The fake image shows the Congress set to win 144-152 seats in the 182 member Gujarat assembly, while the BJP would be reduced to just 26-32 seats.
However, a look at the original news bulletin reveals that it was the BJP that was predicted to win 144-152 seats in the opinion poll, with the Congress getting 26-32 seats.
Watch the original ABP News bulletin from 17:55 below:
This implies that the numbers of the two parties were conveniently swapped in the fake image.
Moreover, the text displayed on the fake image has also been changed from "Desh mein Modi ki lahar barkarar (The Modi wave continues in the country)" of the original image to "Desh mein Modi ki leher par break (There is a break on the Modi wave in the country)"
An article published on the ABP News website on 31 August, discussed the results of this opinion poll, saying that "Prime Minister Narendra Modi and Chief Minister Vijay Rupani's charisma will fetch a clean sweep for the ruling BJP in upcoming assembly elections".
The article also discussed the various other results of the opinion poll, including the BJP getting 59 percent vote as per the then voting intentions of voters, as well as Vijay Rupani being the preferred Chief Ministerial candidate.
Meanwhile, earlier this month, the India Today-Axis My India opinion poll predicted that the BJP will get 115-125 seats in Gujarat, while the Congress was expected to win 57-65 seats. The opinion poll predicted that the vote share of the BJP will be lesser than the 59 percent it enjoyed in 2015. Incidentally, the poll also predicted that the Congress will gain vote share by six percent, compared to the 2014 elections.
The voting for the Gujarat elections would be held on 9 and 14 December, and the results are scheduled to be declared on 18 December.
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