Fact Check: Did One Person Cast 5 Consecutive Votes for BJP in Assam

Assam’s Karimganj Lok Sabha seat was up for election in the second round on April 26, 2024. Did someone vote five times in a row for the BJP candidate? This question was answered by a service that checks facts.
Here is a copy of the tweet that has been saved.

Fact

Searching for “Karimganj voter fraud” on Google led Newschecker to a report from April 28, 2024, that said the video that went viral and caused a political firestorm was supposedly taken during a fake election. This led to the District Election Officer (DEO) sending a “show-cause” notice to the polling officials.

The person checking the facts found this news release from the District Election Officer, Karimganj. It was posted on April 28, 2024, by the official Twitter account of the District Commissioner, Karimganj.

“On April 26, a video is going around social media that shows a small group of people voting for the BJP candidate…When this complaint was received, the issue was looked into. According to the Presiding Officer, Shri. Nazrul Haque Tapadar, the video in question was taken during a practice poll, and then CRC (Close Result Clear) was done before the real poll began. The comments of people seen in the shared video also back this up. One of them is Abdul Sahid S/o Ajimuddinn, Vill – Chenjur, who is working as a polling agent for Abdul Hameed, an independent candidate, the press release said.

The DEO sent out another news release on April 28, 2024, saying again that the video was only taken during the mock poll and had nothing to do with the real polling, where no rules were broken.

“This was also confirmed and made clear during the scrutiny process, which took place at 11 a.m. on April 27, 2024, with the General Observer and Contesting Candidates present.” It should be made clear, though, that what happened during the mock election was a clear violation of ECI rules that say people can’t bring cell phones into the voting station.

The video shows the polling agent for independent candidate Abdul Hameed. He is said to have said that the event happened because poll workers were careless and left the EVMs unattended during breakfast hours. “Abdul Sahid told me that the video was made for fun before the election started at around 6:30 am.” This proves that it wasn’t taken during the real election on Friday.

Also, in a tweet from April 29, 2024, the Election Commission of India called the claim in the video “false and misleading” and said it was not true.