General elections will be held in India between 19 April, 2024, and 1 June, 2024, to elect 543 members of the 18th Lok Sabha. In the run up to the polls, images and videos related to the elections have been doing the rounds on social media. Amid this, an image showing several people holding a banner with words ‘NO VOTE TO BJP’ at a rally is going viral with the claim that it shows a protest against the BJP in Tamil Nadu before the upcoming Lok Sabha elections.
The caption of the viral image states, “The Mood of the Nation! #Tamilnadu_Rejects_bjp”
Fact Check
We started our investigation by running a keyword and reverse image search on Google. The results led us to the same image uploaded on stock image website Alamy with the caption: “People shout slogan, carry placards, banners during anti RSS-BJP rally before election in Kolkata, India, 10 March, 2021”.
Upon further search, we found the same image in an article published by India Today on 10 March, 2021. The caption of the report says: “Activists holding banner and placards raise slogans against BJP ahead of the West Bengal assembly polls in Kolkata”.
In this sequence, we searched for news related to “No Vote to BJP” campaign and found that a group of political activists had set up this platform in West Bengal. According to news reports in March 2021, a platform named ‘Bengal Against Fascist RSS-BJP’ had organised a ‘No vote for BJP’ campaign. The investigation led us to several news articles, such as those published by The Wire and The Hindu in February and May 2021.
According to a report published by The Times Of India in April 2021, the campaign was spread across 20 districts in West Bengal. One such protest was in Kolkata, where people were seen holding a “No Vote To BJP” poster.
Taking into account these evidences, we can clearly understand that an old image of a campaign against the BJP in West Bengal is being falsely shared as a protest in Tamil Nadu.
Earlier, we had debunked a videos from the same protest, which was being claimed as being connected to the Karnataka assembly elections and General Elections 2024.
Conclusion
Fact Crescendo found the claim made along with the viral image to be Misleading. The image shows an anti-BJP campaign that was carried out ahead of the West Bengal assembly elections in 2021. It has no links with the upcoming 2024 General elections or Tamil Nadu.
(Written By: Usha Manoj)
This story was originally published by Fact Crescendo as part of the Shakti Collective. Apart from the headline, excerpt and introduction, this story has not been edited by ThePrint.
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