Brazilian photo for 22 voters in Haryana: Rahul says lakhs of votes were rigged

What does an image clicked by a Brazilian photographer have to do with the Haryana election? As per the latest in the series of press conferences by Leader of Opposition Rahul Gandhi on alleged electoral manipulation on Wednesday, the stock image of a model by a Brazilian photographer was used to create 22 voters in the list. Rahul cited it as an example of a centralised rigging of voter data in the Haryana Assembly election, which the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) won in October 2024. 

Using the Election Commission of India’s data, Rahul alleged that 25 lakh fake voters were added to the electoral rolls in the Assembly election, where Congress lost by a mere 22,779 votes.

This was a much-anticipated press conference, as the LoP had earlier warned of dropping a hydrogen bomb in connection with his ‘VoterChori’ campaign. Terming H-files for the electoral data from Haryana, Rahul said that it was about how the entire state was stolen through a centralised scheme, which he termed ‘Operation Sarkar Chori’.  

While the majority of opinion polls and exit polls predicted a landslide victory for Congress, the BJP had won 48 out of the 90 seats and became the first party in the history of Haryana to win for the third consecutive time. 

Stock photos in electoral rolls

Rahul said that the image of the woman had appeared 22 times in 10 different booths under different names, such as Seema, Sweety, Saraswati, Rasmi, Vimla, etc. “What does a Brazilian woman do in the electoral list of Haryana? She is one of the 25 lakh people added to the electoral roll,” he said. 

As per the Quick Response code shared in the presentation, the photo seemed to have first appeared in Unsplash, a community of visual creators for sharing photos, logos, graphics, etc. The image was published in 2017 by one Matheus Ferrero, a Brazil-based photographer. The woman has not been identified, and it is unclear from the website whether she is a professional model or a Brazilian citizen. 

Citing the image as an example, Rahul alleged that there were 25 fake voters in the electoral roll of Haryana. These included 5 lakh duplicate votes, 93,174 invalid addresses, and 19,26,351 bulk voters. Rahul alleged that one in eight voters in Haryana were fake. He said that the Election Commission has denied them access to Forms 6 and 7 following their revelations on the alleged misuse of these forms in Mahadevapura and Aland Assembly constituencies in Karnataka.

“We saw the same photos and documents appearing again and again. The Election Commission has software to remove duplicates. They are not doing it just to help the BJP,” he said.

Rahul also alleged that thousands of voters, including BJP leaders, were voting in both Uttar Pradesh and Haryana. Rahul claimed that a massive 3.5 lakh voters were deleted ahead of the Lok Sabha elections in Haryana. 

House number ‘0’

Rahul contested the statement of Chief Election Commissioner Gyanesh Kumar that those who were shown with House ‘0’ in the electoral rolls were homeless people. Pointing to an image of a house of one Narendra, a native of Haryana, Rahul said that they have physically verified such claims and found out that they were not homeless. “The Chief Election Commission is openly lying to the people of India,” he said. 

Rahul also alleged that ECI has purposely not verified houses with multiple voters, even though rules say that it should be done when there are more than 10 voters in a single address. 

Appeals to Gen Z, youth 

Stating that theft and murder of democracy and the Constitution were happening through manipulation of voter rolls, Rahul appealed to the country’s Gen Z and youth to restore democracy with Satya (truth) and Ahimsa (non-violence).

Rahul said that he was confident that the manipulation of voter rolls would be repeated in Bihar, which will be held from November 6 to 11. He introduced voters from Bihar at the press conference, who alleged that their names were deleted from the rolls ahead of the election. 

This report was republished from The News Minute as part of The News Minute-Newslaundry alliance. Read about our partnership here and become a subscriber here.