Amid the 2024 Lok Sabha elections, a video is circulating on social media depicting police escorting two burqa-clad women out of a location, purportedly suggesting “fake voting”.
The Facebook post reads: “Women caught doing fake voting under the garb of Burqa…”
The above post can be seen here. (Archive)
FACT CHECK
NewsMobile fact-checked the video in question, and found it to be false.
Running the video keyframes through Reverse Image Search, the NM team identified a post on X, dated 15 February 2022, which indicated that the footage depicted scenes from Rampur in Uttar Pradesh.
Searching further, we traced multiple reports regarding the incident from Hindi news organisations here and here, stating that two burqa-clad women were apprehended for allegedly attempting to engage in ‘fake voting’ during the second phase of polling for the 2022 Uttar Pradesh assembly elections.
As per a report by Live Hindustan, the pair — Muskaan and Rani, identified to be mother and daughter, made multiple attempts to cast votes at the booth located in GRPG College (Government Raza PG College) in Rampur, Uttar Pradesh. The District Election Officer, Ravindra Kumar, informed that one of them managed to cast a fraudulent vote.
The Dainik Bhaskar also reported that Kumar cautioned against attempting similar acts, emphasising that polling personnel were equipped to handle such situations. He stated that legal action would be taken against both women. In total, eight individuals, including the aforementioned duo, were discovered to be involved in electoral malpractice during the second phase of polling in the state.
Hence, we can conclusively say that an old video from Uttar Pradesh is being falsely linked to the 2024 Lok Sabha elections as a ‘voting fraud’.
