CLAIM
A video showing some men sitting inside a hotel room with EVMs has gone viral on social media with the claim, "this is how BJP and Modi won the elections."
In the video, the person behind the camera can be heard questioning the men with the EVMs, asking them why the EVMs are inside the hotel room when they should be in a strongroom, to which one of the men responds that "these machines are extra".
The video has been shared with a message in Malayalam, which reads "എവിഎം മിഷൻ വെച്ച് കളിച്ച മോദിയുടെ കള്ളക്കളി പുറത്തുവന്നിരിക്കുന്നു മാക്സിമം എല്ലാ ഗ്രൂപ്പിലേക്കും ഷെയർ ചെയ്യുക."
This translates to, "Modi's dirty game with EVMs has been exposed. Share in all groups."
The Quint also received this video on it's WhatsApp helpline with the same claim.
TRUE OR FALSE?
The video, while true, is from the Madhya Pradesh Assembly elections which were held in December 2018, and has been shared with the misleading claim that it is from the Lok Sabha election.
WHAT WE FOUND OUT
For starters, in the video, one of the men mention that they are from Shajapur, which is a district in Madhya Pradesh.
A reverse image search for one of the key frames from the video led to a report by Hindi website The Lallantop on the incident, dated 1 December 2018, which states that the video was a sting operation conducted by Aaj Tak's Madhya Pradesh correspondent Manoj Purohit.
According to the report, the men in the video are election commission officials, who had lodged in a room at the Raj Mahal Hotel in Shajapur, with the EVMs on 27 November, a day before polling took place in the state.
When the matter was brought to the EC's notice by Purohit, the poll body suspended the men seen in the video, the report added.
The video was also tweeted out by political analyst Sarvesh Tiwari on 30 November.
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