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A South American stylist named Larissa Nery, who has been gaining attention in India this week after her photograph was displayed over the news in an claim about reported election fraud, has told that she initially thought it was all a mistake. Or a prank.

But then her online profiles blew up and people started tagging her on Instagram.

"At first it was a few random messages. I thought they were confusing me for someone else," she said. "Later they sent me the video where my face appeared on a big screen. I thought it was AI or some prank. But then lots of people started messaging at the same time and I understood it was actually happening."

Nery, who resides in Belo Horizonte, the capital city of southeastern Brazil's Minas Gerais state, and has not once been to India, says she searched on Google to comprehend what was going on.

The Events That Transpired

What had occurred was the fallout of a media briefing by Indian political figure Rahul Gandhi on Wednesday where he accused Prime Minister Narendra Modi's party BJP and the Election Commission (EC) of committing voter fraud in last year's election in Haryana state. The BJP has denied the claims.

Hours after the media event, the election authority of Haryana shared a letter they said they had sent to Gandhi in August asking him to sign an oath with the names of ineligible voters "in order that necessary proceedings could be initiated". They did not respond to the specific allegations he made and did not provide statements on Nery's case.

Gandhi has made a series of claims of "vote theft" against the poll panel since early August.

In his most recent claims, he said his team had looked through the Election Commission's voter list data and found that of the approximately 20 million voters, 2.5 million were irregular entries - including repeated entries, bulk voters and invalid addresses. He blamed his party's loss in the Haryana election on this alleged manipulation of the voters' list.

To demonstrate his claims, he showed a series of slides on a big screen. One of them showed Gandhi positioned in front of a large image of Nery, while another showed a collection of 22 voters with different names and addresses but all with her images.

"Who is this lady? What age is she? She casts ballots 22 times in Haryana," Gandhi said.

He explained that a single stock photo of a woman, taken by Brazilian photographer Matheus Ferrero, had been used repeatedly across numerous voter entries under various names. He referred to Nery as a model who had been listed on the voters' list under many names, including Seema, Sweety and Saraswati.

The Reality Behind the Photo

The 29-year-old confirmed that it was certainly her in the photograph. "Absolutely. It is me. Much younger, but it is me. I am the individual in the images."

She explained that she was a hairdresser and not a model and that the photo was taken in March 2017 when she was 21, just outside her home. The photographer, she said, "thought I was pretty and asked to photograph of me".

Now years later, all the attention in the past two days from "people from India, many of them reporters", has left her frightened.

"I felt fear. I cannot determine if it is dangerous for me or if speaking about it could harm someone there. I do not know who is right or wrong because I do not know the parties involved," she expressed.

"I did not go to work in the morning because I could not even see messages from my clients. Many journalists were calling me. They located the number of the place where I work.

"I had to remove the salon name from my profile because they were disturbing my workplace. My boss even talked to me. Some people treat it like a meme, but it is affecting me in my career."

The Camera Artist's Viewpoint

Matheus Ferrero, who took Nery's photo, is also overwhelmed by the unexpected attention. Until not long ago, he says India meant only Caminho das Índias - the 2009 Brazilian television series - to him.

He's still trying to understand the events of the last few days in a country a great distance away.

Some people had contacted to him from India a week back, asking him who the woman in the photo was, he explained.

"I didn't respond. I'm not going to provide someone's name like that. And I hadn't seen this friend in years," he said. "I thought it was a fraud. I ignored and reported it."

But since Gandhi's media appearance, "things have escalated dramatically".

"People were calling me on Instagram and Facebook. It was terrible. I disabled my Instagram to try to understand what was going on. Later I googled and realised what was occurring, but at first I had no idea."

Ferrero says some websites placed his pictures next to Nery's photo without permission. "Individuals were creating jokes, like turning it into a game show joke. It's ridiculous."

In 2017, Ferrero was just beginning his career as a photographer when he invited Nery, who he knew, to come out for a photo session. Ferrero said he shared the photos on his Facebook and also posted them on Unsplash - a photo website - with her permission.

"The photo blew up… achieved around 57 million impressions," he stated.

He has now removed the link from his Unsplash account but he provided screenshots taken earlier that showed other photos of Nery from the same shoot.

"I deleted them out of concern, because the photos were being misused. I got scared imagining this happening to other people I photographed. I felt violated. A lot of random people coming at me. You think 'Did I do something wrong?' But I didn't. The website was open and I posted like countless of others." He's also now made the original Facebook post with her photos private.

"When you see people accessing your Twitter, Facebook, private Instagram, you become alarmed. The first reaction is to close all accounts and understand later. Some people thought it was funny, like a soap opera, but I felt violated."

Life Changing Circumstances

Not one of Ferrero or Nery have ever been to India and are still trying to comprehend how something that occurred at the far side of the world could turn their lives upside down.

When asked if all this contributed to uncover electoral fraud, would that be beneficial?

"Yes, I think that would be good. But I don't truly know the specifics," he said.

Nery who has not once left the country states: "This situation is far from my reality. I do not even pay attention to elections in Brazil, let alone in a different country."