By Nivedita Niranjankumar
Delhi Chief Minister and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP) leader Arvind Kejriwal in a now deleted tweet shared a doctored ABP News video, which claimed Congress is out of contention in the upcoming Gujarat assembly elections leaving AAP to battle it out with the incumbent Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) in the state.
The video, which went viral after Kejriwal tweeted it had morphed graphics and a fake male voiceover.
Kejriwal on October 19, 2022 tweeted the doctored video with a caption in Hindi that translates to, "to understand the mood in Gujarat please watch this video"
(Original text in Hindi - गुजरात के मूड को समझने के लिए इस वीडियो को ज़रूर देखे)
The cached version of the tweet by Kejriwal can be seen on Yahoo and Microsoft Bing search engines.
View the archive for the Yahoo search cache here and Microsoft Bing cache here. The cache preview shows that Kejriwal tweeted the video at 3pm on October 19, 2022.
Replies to the now deleted tweet and referring to the ABP video can be seen below
In the viral video, the voiceover claims that AAP is all set to form the government in Gujarat as strategies and roadshows by Prime Minister Narendra Modi and the BJP are not having the desired impact on potential voters. The voiceover further claims that Congress is not making efforts towards winning the Gujarat elections and is out of the race altogether.
In addition to the voiceover, the ticker, graphics, images and the text shown in the viral video also make the same claim predicting an AAP victory in Gujarat.
The report has been edited in a way to make the claim that ABP News did a ground report in Gujarat and found that AAP is set to win.
The same fake claim with the fake video was shared by many other AAP leaders and fan pages of Kejriwal and AAP.
Saroj Vavaliya, Secretary of the Women's wing of the AAP Surat unit shared with a claim in Hindi.
Rina Raval, Vice President for Aam Aadmi Party in Gujarat shared the doctored video quoting the same text as Kejriwal's tweet.
Another Kejriwal fan page on Facebook also shared the same edited video
FACT CHECK
We first noticed that the viral video had several discrepancies including jump-cuts in the audio, the red ticker not matching the usual red colour used by ABP and a difference in the text font in several places.
A search for the story on ABP's YouTube channel showed a video uploaded by them on October 16, 2022 with a title in Hindi that translates to, "What is the reality behind Arvind Kejriwal's claim about the IB report. Watch our ground report | Gujarat Election"
(Original text in Hindi - क्या है Arvind Kejriwal के IB रिपोर्ट के दावा का सच ? देखिए ये ग्राउंड रिपोर्ट | Gujarat Election)
When we compared the viral video with the original report by ABP video, we found that viral video has a different male voiceover added to it to support the fake claim.
In the original video, the voiceover speaks about a press conference held by Kejriwal on October 2, where he claimed that according to a recent Intelligence Bureau report, AAP will form the government in Gujarat. The voiceover then explains the claim made by Kejriwal and goes on to explain who are the candidates for AAP in the Gujarat elections, whose dates are yet to be announced.
Watch original video below:
In comparison, the voiceover in the viral video, claims that Congress is not focusing on the Gujarat elections and that the fight for the state will only be between BJP and AAP. The edited voiceover further claims while Congress is not even active on social media with regards to the Gujarat elections, the strategies used by BJP and Prime Minister Narendra Modi are failing to impress voters in the state.
A further look showed that the graphic and ticker text in the original news story by ABP had also been swapped with fabricated ones supporting the fake claim.
In the ABP video, the graphics were about whether the IB report cited by Kejriwal is true and had text like 'Reality check' and 'What is the truth behind Kejriwal's claim'.
In the viral video, this text has been altered to say, 'Congress is not active, not holding public gatherings'.
While the fake video is 2 minutes 20 seconds, the original news story by ABP is over 12 minutes with the reporter speaking to an AAP member and locals in Gujarat. In addition nowhere in the original news story aired by ABP does the reporter or channel mention the popularity of Congress or BJP compared to AAP.
