Old Video of Campaign Against BJP Falsely Linked to 2023 Karnataka Elections

A video showing several people across the globe holding up signs that read 'No Vote to BJP' (Bharatiya Janata Party) has gone viral on social media.

Who is sharing the claim?: The Twitter accounts of the Kerala Pradesh Congress Sevadal, Overseas Congress social media coordinator Vijay Thottathil and Congress national coordinator Deepak Khatri shared the video, linking it to the upcoming 2023 Karnataka Assembly elections.

The state elections are scheduled for 10 May, and the results will be declared on 13 May.

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Is it true?: No, the video is old.

• It shows a campaign against voting for the BJP ahead of the 2021 West Bengal Assembly elections, and was first shared in April 2021.

How did we find out?: On carefully watching the video, we noticed that the card carried text in Bengali under the 'No Vote to BJP" sign.

Taking a cue from this, we conducted a keyword search for 'No Vote for BJP Bengal'.

• Its result led us to many news articles, such as ones by The Wire and The Hindu dated February and May 2021, respectively.

• They discussed the prominence of the campaign before and during the 2021 West Bengal Assembly elections.

• The keyword search also led us a Twitter account with the username '@No_Vote_To_BJP', which had shared a tweet with the same video on 24 April 2021.

• We found a clearer version of the video on 'No Vote to BJP''s YouTube channel as well, which had also shared it on 2 Apil 2021.

Conclusion: An old video of a campaign against voting for the BJP in West Bengal is being falsely linked to the upcoming 2023 Karnataka Assembly elections.

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