A video clip of Rahul Gandhi is widely circulating on social media platforms where he allegedly stated, “that the BJP is trying to unite the people, on the other hand, the Congress party is dividing the people on the basis of religion and region.” Through this article, let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: Video of Rahul Gandhi saying, “the BJP is trying to unite the people, on the other hand, the Congress party is dividing the people on the basis of religion and region”.
Fact: This video is from Rahul Gandhi’s address during a public meeting in Morena, Madhya Pradesh, during the ‘Bharat Jodo Nyaya Yatra’ flag handover ceremony held on 02 March 2024. The original video of Rahul Gandhi’s speech has been edited between timestamps 20:11 to 20:30 and shared with a false narrative. In the original video, Rahul Gandhi stated that “the BJP people are dividing people on the basis of religion, caste, and region. On the other hand, the Congress party is trying to unite the people”. Hence, the claim made in the post is FALSE.
To verify the authenticity of the viral video, we conducted a relevant keyword search on the internet and found the complete video of this public meeting on the official YouTube channel of the Indian National Congress. The public meeting was livestreamed on 02 March 2024 with the title “Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra flag handover ceremony in Morena, Madhya Pradesh.” This flag handover ceremony was organized at Bhimrao Ambedkar Stadium in Morena city as Rahul Gandhi’s Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra entered Madhya Pradesh from Rajasthan on 02 March 2024.
Upon careful review of the entire video, we discovered that the original video was edited between timestamps 20:11 to 20:30. Originally, in his speech, Rahul Gandhi said, “BJP ke log ek dharm ko dusre dharm se baat rahe hain, ek jaath ko dusre jaath se baat rahe hain, ek Pradesh ko dusre Pradesh se baat rahe hain, aur dusri taraf Congress party sab ko ek saath lane ki koshish kar rahi hai.” When translated from Hindi to English, it reads, “The BJP people are dividing people on the basis of religion, caste, and region. While on the other hand, the Congress party is trying to unite the people.” Rahul Gandhi’s speech on the official website of the Indian National Congress also mentions the same.
News reports also covered Rahul Gandhi’s speech in Morena, Madhya Pradesh (here & here). Our investigation reveals that the original video has been edited between the timestamps 20:11 and 20:30 and is being shared to disseminate misinformation.
To sum it up, an edited video of Rahul Gandhi is being shared, alleging that he acknowledged that the Congress party is dividing the country in the name of religion, caste, and regions.
