A video is being shared on social media claiming that Congress national president Mallikarjun Kharge while addressing a rally in Shimla, announced Sachin Pilot as the new Chief Minister candidate for Rajasthan replacing Ashok Gehlot. This post claims that Mallikarjun Kharge had made this announcement as a move to punish Ashok Gehlot for rebelling against the party. Let’s verify the claim made in the post.
Claim: Mallikarjun Kharge while addressing a rally in Shimla announced to make Sachin Pilot the new Chief Minister of Rajasthan.
Fact: The video shared in the post shows Mallikarjun Kharge’s speech at Banuti in the Shimla rural constituency on 09 November 2022. This rally was organized as part of the Congress party’s campaign for the Himachal Pradesh elections 2022. During this rally, Mallikarjun Kharge did not make any such announcement of making Sachin Pilot the new Chief Minister of Rajasthan by replacing Ashok Gehlot. Hence, the claim made in the post is FALSE.
On watching the full video, one could notice that Mallikarjun Kharge had not made any statement referring to Sachin Pilot or Ashok Gehlot or Rajasthan politics during his speech. On observing the video carefully, one could see a banner with the text, “Parivarthan Prathigna Rally” (when translated from Hindi to English), placed in the background of the meeting. This banner displayed at the meeting described that the meeting was held on 09 November 2022, at Banuti in the Shimla rural constituency.
When we searched for this video using keywords on the internet, a video showing Mallikarjun Kharge’s full speech at the Banuti rally was found on the official YouTube channel of the Indian National Congress. On 09 November 2022, Congress organised a rally as part of the election campaign for the Himachal Pradesh elections that was held on 12 November 2022. Addressing the Banuti rally, Mallikarjun Kharge criticised the BJP government for increasing unemployment in the country and misleading people by making exaggerated election promises. Mallikarjun Kharge in his speech at the Banuti rally promised that Congress will deliver all its election promises including 5 lakhs jobs for youth, restoring the old pension scheme, 300 units of free electricity, loan waivers to farmers. Mallikarjun Kharge did not make any such announcement of making Sachin Pilot the new Chief Minister of Rajasthan during this rally.
Several news websites published articles reporting Mallikarjun Kharge’s speech at the Banuti rally in Shimla. They can be seen here and here. None of these news reports reported that Mallikarjun Kharge made an announcement of making Sachin Pilot the new Chief Minister of Rajasthan. If Mallikarjun Kharge had made such a statement of replacing Ashok Gehlot with Sachin Pilot as the new CM of Rajasthan, it would have been widely reported. But we could not find a single news report report confirming this.
To sum it up, Mallikarjun Kharge hasn’t made any announcement about making Sachin Pilot the Chief Minister of Rajasthan by replacing Ashok Gehlot.
