News Checker Fact Check: Lok Sabha elections 2024 are now in their final phase. Voting for the 7th and last phase will be held on Saturday, June 1. The election results will be declared on June 4. But even before the election results, such videos are going viral on social media, in which it is being claimed that some candidates have accepted their defeat even before the results. One such video is being shared on social media about BJP candidate Manoj Tiwari from Delhi’s North-East Lok Sabha seat, in which he is accepting his defeat even before the election results. But this video is fake.
News Checker (newschecker.in) The fact check team of google searched keywords like ‘Manoj Tiwari’, ‘Jist’ and ‘interview’ due to the presence of Jist logo on the viral clip. During the investigation, this video was found uploaded on March 31, 2024 on the YouTube channel of ‘Jist News’. This is an interview of BJP leader Manoj Tiwari.
At around 34 minutes into the interview, the viral clip is seen where Manoj Tiwari says, “Look, we had a feeling of defeat….” To understand the context, watch and listen to the full interview.
At around 27 minutes into the video, journalist Anil Sharda asks Manoj Tiwari, “Before Delhi, you contested the 2009 election from Gorakhpur on a Samajwadi Party ticket against Yogi Adityanath, shed some light on this…”
Answering this question, Manoj Tiwari tells how he had no political background till that time and he contested that election on the insistence of Amar Singh. He told that he did not want to contest the election at that time, but when Amar Singh asked him to contest in the presence of Amitabh Bachchan, he could not firmly refuse. Manoj Tiwari says that during that time even the SP workers in Gorakhpur were asking him that how did you come here against Yogi ji. According to Manoj Tiwari, even the SP officials were telling him that if you had fought from the side, you would have won, here we ourselves will not vote for you. Due to which he had fled from Gorakhpur to Mumbai during the election. In the same sequence, he further says, “Look, I had realized my defeat. But the sad thing was that I was winning and winning for a long time. I had felt that now defeat has come.”
Further in the investigation, we spoke on the phone to Anil Sharda, a journalist of Jist News who took this interview of Manoj Tiwari. Anil told that the viral video is being shared with a misleading claim. He said that during this time Manoj Tiwari was mentioning the election he fought against Yogi Adityanath on SP ticket in 2009. Anil Sharda told that Manoj Tiwari was telling how he had contested the election from Gorakhpur on the behest of Amar Singh, but Yogi’s popularity was even among SP workers in Gorakhpur, the stronghold of Yogi Adityanath. Due to which he had sensed his defeat even before the election results.
It is clear from the evidence found during the investigation that an incomplete video of Manoj Tiwari is being shared with a misleading claim.
(This story was originally published by newschecker.in. Fact Check Desk, as part of the Shakti Collective. Except for the headline/excerpt/opening introduction para this story has not been edited by News18india.com staff)
Tags: Fact Check, Fake news, Lok Sabha Elections, Manoj Tiwari
FIRST PUBLISHED : May 25, 2024, 18:41 IST