An old video from the 2019 Lok Sabha Elections of a man seen voting on behalf of three women in a polling booth has gone viral with the claim that it shows an incidence of booth capturing during the recently concluded Bihar Assembly elections.
CLAIM
The official Twitter handle of Rashtriya Janata Dal shared the video with the caption: “देश में चुनाव अयोग्य की देखरेख में अब ऐसे चुनाव होते हैं!”
(Translated: Elections are now being conducted in such a way under the Election Commission)
In a now deleted post, a user on Facebook shared the video with the claim: “BJP voting officer... pressing button before the uneducated muslim women vote in Bihar (sic).”
The video was also shared with a similar claim in Hindi, “बिहार वोटिंग मतदान में धांधली का वीडियो!”
(Translation: “Video of rigging in Bihar voting.”)
WHAT WE FOUND OUT
The video is not from the recently held Bihar Assembly elections, but from an incidence of booth capturing in Faridabad's Asaoti village in Haryana during the 2019 Lok Sabha elections.
A reverse image search led us to a tweet shared by a user in May 2019. When prompted by the Haryana Chief Electoral Officer’s official Twitter handle to take necessary action, the District Election Office of Faridabad had replied that an FIR was lodged and the accused was “behind bars.”
“Observer enquired the matter personally and is satisfied that polling was never vitiated,” the tweet further stated.
A keyword search of the same led us to a report by NDTV, carrying the same visuals, dated 13 May 2019.
The report states that “A polling agent in Faridabad near Delhi was arrested on Sunday after he allegedly influenced voters in the sixth round of the national election.”
The Quint had also reported on the incident at the time.
The man, identified as Giriraj Singh, had denied all charges and he stated that he was only trying to help the villagers.
NDTV had also reported that they had managed to track down one of the three women from the video. She had confirmed that the agent had indeed directed her to punch the lotus symbol and vote for the BJP.
The EC had then ordered a re-polling at the booth on 19 May 2019.
Evidently, a video of booth capturing from Haryana in the 2019 Lok Sabha Elections has been falsely revived as an incident during the Bihar Assembly Elections held in November 2020.
(Update: The story was updated to include Rashtriya Janata Dal’s tweet that had the viral video.)
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