A video clip of Rahul Gandhi is widely circulating on social media platforms with the claim that Rahul Gandhi said people will die of hunger by saying ‘Bharat Mata ki jai’ and ‘Jai Shree Ram’. This article aims to fact-check the claim in the post.
Claim: Rahul Gandhi said people will die of hunger by saying ‘Bharat Mata ki jai’ and ‘Jai Shree Ram’.
Fact: Rahul Gandhi addressed a public meeting in Amethi, Uttar Pradesh, during the ‘Bharat Jodo Nyaya Yatra’ on 19 February 2024. The original video of Rahul Gandhi’s speech has been clipped between timestamp 26:22 to 26:29 and from timestamp 26:59 to 27:10, and shared with a false narrative, distorting the context of his speech. Originally, Rahul Gandhi made these statements while criticizing the Central Government on the issue of unemployment. Hence, the claim 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. This public meeting was live-streamed on 19 February 2024 with the title: “Shri Mallikarjun Kharge and Shri Rahul Gandhi address the public in Amethi, Uttar Pradesh.” The meeting took place in Amethi during the Bharat Jodo Nyay Yatra. If one carefully watches this full-length video, the context of Rahul Gandhi’s words is clear.
Upon careful review of the entire video, we discovered that the original video was edited between timestamps 26:22 to 26:29 and from timestamps 26:59 to 27:10. Hence, the context of his comments was missing in the viral video. Originally, Rahul Gandhi made these statements while criticizing the Central Government on the issue of unemployment. In his speech, Rahul Gandhi said, “In the inauguration ceremony of the Ram Temple, did you see a Dalit, did you see a farmer? The President of India was not allowed inside, did you see a farmer or labourer? You have seen Adani, you have seen Ambani, you have seen Amitabh Bachchan, your Hindustan does not exist. Your job is to say, ‘Bharat Mata Ki Jai’ and ‘Jai Shri Ram’. Their (Adani and Ambani) job is to count money, their job is to fly in a private plane, their job is to have fun, your job is to look here and there, look there brother, Pakistan, look there brother Amitabh Bachchan has performed a new dance, keep doing it brother, keep doing it… do as much as you want, have fun, everyone will die of hunger, everyone will die of hunger, everyone’s time will come, no one will be left… everyone will die of hunger.” (Translation from Hindi to English).
Other news reports covering Rahul Gandhi’s statements can be seen here and here. Therefore, it can be inferred that an incomplete video of Rahul Gandhi’s speech has been taken out of context, falsely suggesting that he said people will die of hunger by chanting ‘Bharat Mata ki jai’ and ‘jai Shree Ram’.
To sum it up, the selective excerpts from Rahul Gandhi’s speech have been taken out of context, falsely implying that he stated people would die of hunger for uttering ‘Bharat Mata ki jai’ and ‘Jai Shree Ram’.
