Video of people pledging to not vote for Congress is old, and unrelated to Karauli violence - Alt News
Abhishek Kumar
25th April 2022 / 7:03 pm / Last updated: 16th May 2022
A video of a group of people pledging to not vote for Congress has been gathering widespread traction recently. It has been claimed that locals angered by the religious violence in Karauli, Rajasthan earlier this month took an oath to not vote for the ruling Congress party. A Facebook page named ‘Manoj Tiwari For Delhi’ posted the visuals and wrote, “We pledge that we will not vote for Congress due to the Ramnavami incident in Karauli, Rajasthan. Oust the Congress, save the country! Jai Shri Ram.” The video racked up over 63,000 views and was shared by more than 1,000 users.
Another user tweeted the video with the same claim. (Archive link)
रामनवमी करौली कांड राजस्थान से हम
संकल्प लेते है की कांग्रेस को वोट नहीं देंगे 🚩
!!कांग्रेस भगाओ देश बसाओ!!
‼️जय श्री राम ‼️
वैसे ये राजस्थान वाले हर ५ साल में ऐसी क़सम खाते हैं 😜😜🏃‍♂️🏃‍♂️ pic.twitter.com/zPGPWqc4Ks
— तैमूर का जीजा💪🇮🇳🇮🇳🇮🇳 (@brijeshchaodhry) April 12, 2022
A user also tagged Rajasthan chief minister Ashok Gehlot. (Archive link)
The video is widespread on Facebook and Twitter with the same claim.
Taking a closer look at the video, we noticed a poster that reads ‘‘बेरोजगार एकीकृत महासंघ’ (Berozgar Ekikrit Mahasangh).
We performed a keyword search based on this information, which led us to an article by Patrika dated November 4, 2020. The report says that the Rajasthan Berozgar Ekikrit Mahasangh decided in a meeting that it would launch a signature campaign against Congress on November 17 and appeal to voters to not cast their ballot for the party.
With the help of some keywords, we also came across another Patrika article from November 17, 2020. It states that on November 17, unemployed workers organized a meeting under the leadership of the Berozgar Ekitrit Mahasangh at Ramlila Maidan in Sikar. State President Upen Yadav said in the meeting, “The state government must announce the vacancies before the Zilla Parishad and Panchayat elections, otherwise unemployed workers will not only boycott the Congress by mobilizing but will also campaign against it in the elections.” The participants also took a pledge during the meeting.
The images carried by Patrika in its article resemble one frame taken from the viral video. It is clear that the footage does depict the Ramlila Maidan in Sikar.
After applying date filters to our keyword search on Twitter, we found an image and video of the incident in a related report by the newspaper affiliated with the organization. (Archive link)
To sum it up, an old video depicting a pledge taken against the ruling Congress party in Sikar, Rajasthan over non-fulfilment of employment demands was falsely linked to the recent Karauli violence.
Abhishek is a senior fact-checking journalist and researcher at Alt News. He has a keen interest in information verification and technology. He is always eager to learn new skills, explore new OSINT tools and techniques. Prior to joining Alt News, he worked in the field of content development and analysis with a major focus on Search Engine Optimization (SEO).
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