A single stock photo of a Brazilian model—downloaded millions of times from Unsplash—was allegedly used to register 22 phantom voters under names like Seema, Sweety, and Saraswati across 10 Haryana polling booths. Rahul Gandhi calls it the ‘H-bomb’ on democracy; the ECI calls it unproven data noise.”
In a bombshell revelation that has sent shockwaves through India’s political corridors, Congress leader and Leader of the Opposition Rahul Gandhi has accused the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) and the Election Commission of India (ECI) of orchestrating large-scale voter fraud in the 2024 Haryana Assembly elections. Dubbed the “H-bomb” or “hydrogen bomb” by Gandhi himself, the allegations center on what he calls “Vote Chori” (vote theft), with a particularly bizarre and tech-savvy twist: the use of a stock photo of an unidentified Brazilian model to fabricate 22 voter entries across multiple polling booths.

A tragic stampede at the Sri Venkateswara Swamy Temple in Kasibugga, Srikakulam, Andhra Pradesh, claimed nine lives and injured dozens during Ekadashi celebrations as a massive crowd overwhelmed the temple’s narrow entry and exit points. The incident, caused by poor crowd management and lack of safety measures, has sparked national outrage and prompted the government to announce compensation and a high-level inquiry. Experts now call for urgent adoption of technology-driven crowd control systems to prevent such disasters at India’s religious sites.