Six government medical colleges in Gujarat: Kanimozhi’s claim correct, AI ‘fact check’ shared by BJP false

A regional women’s conference organized by the DMK on January 26 at Sengipatti in the district of Thanjavur in Tamil Nadu has been in the centre of a controversy after DMK deputy general secretary Kanimozhi Karunanidhi, in her speech, claimed that there are only six government medical colleges in the state of Gujarat.

Tamil Nadu of BJP posted a video on X, where they ‘debunked’ Kanimozhi’s claim as false. A Google Gemini chat answer was attached in the video, according to which there are a total of 24 government medical colleges in Gujarat, and not six. (Archive)

குஜராத்தில் 6 அரசு மருத்துவக் கல்லூரிகள் மட்டுமே உள்ளதாக பொய்யைக் கூறி மாட்டிக்கொண்ட கனிமொழி! pic.twitter.com/3vbXoFeOJu

— BJP Tamilnadu (@BJP4TamilNadu) January 26, 2026

X user @katterumpu_bjp shared the video, ‘calling out’ Kanimozhi Karunanidhi for her ‘lies’, and claiming that there were 24 government medical colleges in Gujarat. (Archive)

பொய் சொல்லுவதில் கருணாநிதி குடும்பத்திலே அமைதியா புளுகுறதுலா இந்த அம்மணி வேற மாதிரி pic.twitter.com/bd3s4IxXJK

— 🇮🇳 கட்டெறும்பு 🚩🛕(மோடியின் குடும்பம்) (@katterumpu_bjp) January 26, 2026

Various other users on X, like (@Mahi1987Mass), (@Saffron_Anil_), and (@ArulkumarBjp) also shared the claim. (Archives: 1, 2, 3)

Screenshots below:

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Fact Check

To verify the authenticity of the viral claim, we ran a relevant keyword search on Google. This led us to an article published by The New Indian Express, in March 2024. It reports that not a single government medical college has been established in the state of Gujarat since 1995. At the time of the report being published, that is, in March 2024, there were a total of six government medical colleges in operation in the state.

Taking a cue from this, we ran another relevant keyword search, and came across a report on The Times of India which corroborated that six government medical colleges were in operation in Gujarat. The story, published in March 2024, is based on a response by state health minister Rushikesh Patel to Congress MLA Amit Chavda’s question in the assembly. The minister clearly said that there were six government medical colleges, 13 GMERS medical colleges, one AIIMS and 20 private medical colleges in Gujarat.

The six government medical colleges are: B J Medical College in Ahmedabad, Medical College in Vadodara, M P Shah Medical College in Jamnagar, N H L Municipal Medical College in Ahmedabad, Government Medical College in Surat, and the Government Medical College in Bhavnagar.

The Gujarat Medical Education and Research Society (GMERS) is a quasi-government body and the 13 colleges operated by it are self-financed institutes managed by an autonomous trust. On the GMERS website, a total of 13 institutes are listed, all of which fall outside the ambit of ‘government’ medical colleges.

To sum up, the claim by Tamil Nadu BJP that there are over 20 government medical colleges in the state of Gujarat is false. There are only six. DMK leader Kanimozhi’s statement, which BJP claimed to have debunked, was correct.