A video has gone viral across social media platforms which shows Bollywood actor Ranveer Singh criticizing Prime Minister Narendra Modi in an interview with ANI. In the 42-second clip, he can be seen claiming that India, under the governance of PM Modi, has witnessed massive unemployment and inflation, and is headed towards a time of injustice. Further, he reminds viewers to remain committed to our aspirations for development and justice and to vote wisely.
His words in the viral video can be translated as follows: “Modiji’s purpose is this.. his aim was this.. that he celebrates our despondence, our fears, unemployment, price-rise.. because India is now heading towards a time of injustice with such great speed.. but we should not forget demanding development and justice. Hence, think and vote.” Then a voice-over says, “Those who care for the country, will vote for Nyay. Vote for Nyay, vote for Congress.”
The idea of ‘Nyay’ or justice has been foregrounded in the Congress 20204 Lok Sabha election manifesto.
X (formerly Twitter) user Sujata Paul (@SujataIndia1st) posted the viral video on April 17, which garnered more than 200,000 views and over 2,000 retweets.
Vote for न्याय
Vote for Congress pic.twitter.com/KmwGDcMImt— Sujata Paul – India First (Sujata Paul Maliah) (@SujataIndia1st) April 17, 2024
Other X users have also shared the clip with the same claim, appealing to audiences to vote for development and change.
Fact Check
First, we noticed that Ranveer Singh’s words were not lip-synced at several instances in the video. The audio was not smooth either.
On running a relevant keyword search on X, we came across this tweet from Asian News International (@ANI) from April 14, which reported that Bollywood actors Ranveer Singh, Kriti Sanon, and fashion designer Manish Malhotra had visited the Kashi Vishwanath temple in Varanasi, Uttar Pradesh, to offer prayers.
#WATCH | Uttar Pradesh: Actor Ranveer Singh says, “I cannot express in words the experience that I have had today. Life long I have been a devotee of lord Shiva and I have come here for the first time…” pic.twitter.com/4s2j7R0x7F
— ANI (@ANI) April 14, 2024
The viral segment of the clip starts around the 1:16 mark of this video, wherein Ranveer Singh praises the fruition of PM Modi’s vision of celebrating and promoting the rich cultural legacy of India.
In the original clip, he says,”Modiji’s purpose was this.. his aim was this.. that he celebrates Indian rich cultural heritage, our history, our legacy. Because Indian is headed towards modernity with such great speed… but we should not forget our roots and cultural heritage…”
So, it is clear that in the viral clip, some words have been digitally altered.
It can be concluded that the viral clip is actually an edited video, in which a deepfake edit of Ranveer Singh’s voice has been superimposed to make it appear as if the Bollywood actor is critiquing PM Modi. In reality, the actor was applauding Narendra Modi for having fulfilled his purpose of promoting the cultural heritage of India while also bringing about development.
Prantik Ali is an intern at Alt News.
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