Old video of BJP’s Vasundhara Raje congratulating Neeraj Chopra on phone falsely linked to Rajasthan polls

A 12-second video clip featuring BJP leader Vasundhara Raje Scindia was recently viral on social media where she could be heard congratulating someone on the phone. Sharing the video at a time when the results of the assembly election were yet to be announced, social media users claimed that Vasundhara Raje was congratulating Independent candidate Ravindra Singh Bhati on his likely victory and trying to garner a majority for the BJP in advance.

The BJP eventually recorded a landslide victory in the Rajasthan assembly elections, the results of which were announced on December 3. Independent candidate Ravindra Singh Bhati won from Barmer’s Sheo constituency. While initially, Bhati had campaigned for the BJP, he parted ways with the party before the polls when the BJP did not give him a ticket.

X user Indrajeet Gurjar (@IndrajitGurjar) shared the video in question on December 1 with a caption in Hindi that can be translated as: “This video is said to be of Vasundhara Raje’s conversation with Ravindra Singh Bhati. It is being claimed in the viral video that Madam is busy in gathering majority for BJP!” (Archive)

ये वीडियो वसुंधरा राजे का रविन्द्र सिंह भाटी के साथ बातचीत का बताया जा रहा है। वायरल वीडियो में दावा किया जा रहा है कि मैडम बीजेपी के बहुमत जुटाने में लग गई हैं!” @RavindraPatel05 pic.twitter.com/qnYfpWorAy

— Indrajeet Gurjar 🇮🇳 (@IndrajitGurjar) December 1, 2023

Several other users shared the video clip with the above claim.

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Fact Check

We noticed that under Ashok Shera’s (@ashokshera94) tweet several users commented that the video was old and Vasundhara Raje was congratulating Olympic Gold Medalist and World champion athlete Neeraj Chopra on the phone.

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On running a relevant keyword search we came across a Facebook post by the news outlet First India from August 12, 2021. The post said: “Former Rajasthan Chief Minister #VasundharaRaje congratulates the golden boy #NeerajChopra over phone on his triumph in #TokyoOlympic”. The post carried the same video that is being shared now.

On August 7, 2021, Javelin Thrower Neeraj Chopra created history by becoming the second individual Indian athlete after Abhinav Bindra to win gold in the Olympic championship. Chopra won gold in the men’s javelin throw at the Tokyo Olympics.

We found the same video of the BJP politician on her official Instagram page. The video was posted two years back and the caption of the post in Hindi can be translated as: “Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra has brought glory to the country and made us all proud. Talked to him yesterday evening and congratulated him on winning the gold medal in #Tokyo2020 and also expressed his heartfelt gratitude on behalf of everyone.

I wish Neeraj a bright future.
#Cheer4India #Gold #indiaatolympics”.

 

View this post on Instagram

 

A post shared by Vasundhara Raje (@vasundhararajeofficial)

Therefore, the claim that Vasundhara Raje congratulated Ravindra Singh Bhati on his likely win in the Rajasthan elections is false. The viral video is two-year old and unrelated to the Rajasthan assembly polls.