A morphed image of a list showing Tamil Nadu Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) chief K Annamalai receiving only one vote at a polling booth during the recently concluded Lok Sabha elections is circulating on X.
BOOM found the original image that shows Annamalai received 101 votes and not one after the first round of counting for the Coimbatore Lok Sabha seat.
K Annamalai, who resigned from his position as an IPS officer and joined the BJP in 2020, was defeated by his Dravida Munnetra Kazhagam (DMK) opponent Ganapathy Rajkumar. With his loss, BJP also missed the opportunity to secure a seat in Tamil Nadu, leaving the party's Lok Sabha seat count in the southern state at zero.
A verified X user shared the image with the caption, "Tamilnadu BJP president Annamalai got 1 vote in a booth. Media also told that he is future BJP's PM candidate". (sic.)
Click here view the post and here for an archive.
Another verified X handle posted the photo and wrote, "BREAKING: BJP future PM candidate Annamalai got 1 vote in a booth".
Click here view the post and here for an archive.
The Free Press Journal also reported the same, citing the above X post.
Fact Check
BOOM noticed that the total number of votes received by Annamalai in the first round of vote counting does not match the figures listed in the column.
In the viral image, it is observed that the BJP candidate received votes in the following amounts: 175, 152, 108, 1, 105, 124, 127, 62, 169, 238, 129, 117, 174, and 71, which add up to a total sum of 1,752 votes. However, we noticed that the total tally shows 1,852 votes instead of 1,752, reflecting a difference of 100 votes.
Taking a cue, we conducted a related keyword search on X and found a post from Dr SG Suryah, BJP Tamil Nadu's state secretary, who debunked the claim by sharing the original image of the list.
Suryah called out an X user, Mini Nair, for making the same claim, and wrote, "Photoshop & Fake News is lifeline of Mini Nair. 101 votes becomes 1 vote if you photoshop & remove 01. Get a life @minicnair Begum."
Click here to view the post and here for an archive.
We noticed that the viral picture shows 1 vote instead of 101, resulting in a discrepancy of 100 votes in the total count. The comparison can be seen below.
We additionally found an X post featuring the image of the list after the first round of vote counts, posted by the Tamil media outlet Sun News on June 4, 2023. The photo also shows 101 votes instead of 1, refuting the claims made by the viral photo.
Click here to view the post and here for an archive.