A video circulating on social media claims to show the Chief Minister of Madhya Pradesh, Shivraj Singh Chouhan, discussing election strategies with officials. In the alleged video, Chouhan appears to speak about Congress leader Kamal Nath and his party, discussing how they need to be stopped as they may introduce improved welfare schemes for the people of Madhya Pradesh. This fact-check article is aimed at deciphering the truth behind this claim.
Claim: The viral video shows Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan discussing election strategies and referring to Kamal Nath
Fact: The original video was actually a meeting held by Chouhan to review a fire incident in Bhopal’s Satpura Bhawan. There was no audio in the original video. Audio has been digitally added to make the viral video. Hence, the claim is False.
To fact-check this claim, by observing the logo of ANI in the video, we performed a search on the internet using relevant keywords. This search led us to an X post by ANI on 13 June 2023, which contained similar visuals as in the viral clip. According to the post’s description, the visuals show a review meeting held by Chouhan with senior government ministers and officials concerning a fire incident at Bhopal’s Satpura Bhawan.
Interestingly, there was no audio in the ANI video, contradicting the viral clip’s voice-over. A similar video related to this meeting was uploaded on ANI News’s YouTube channel, which also lacked audio. This means that the original video may have been manipulated by digitally adding a voice-over to create the impression of Chouhan discussing election strategies. You can find news reports on this meeting here and here.
An additional search on the internet looking for instances where Chouhan made such statements yielded no positive results, lending more credence to the fact that the claim is false.
To sum up, the viral video falsely suggests that Madhya Pradesh Chief Minister Shivraj Singh Chouhan was discussing election strategies when, in actual fact, he was reviewing a fire incident in Bhopal’s Satpura Bhawan.
