Lighthouse Journalism found a video of Prime Minister Narendra Modi interacting with children. The children in the video were heard saying that they had seen Prime Minister Modi on TV. He then asks what he was doing on TV, and the children respond, ‘Vote Chori’.
During the investigation, we found that the video is old and manipulated. In the original video, the children did not say ‘vote chori’. The viral video is fake.
Claim:
Instagram user Chandan Kumar shared the video with a false claim three days ago. Users also responded to the video, thinking it was real.
Other users are also sharing the same video with similar claims.
Investigation:
We started the investigation with a keyword search. A term, ‘My Balvatika’ could be seen in the background.
Through this keyword search, we found an article on indianexpress.com uploaded on July 31, 2023.
The feature image used along with the article was very similar to the viral video.
The report said: Prime Minister Narendra Modi inaugurated the Akhil Bhartiya Shiksha Samagam at Bharat Mandapam in New Delhi on Saturday. The inauguration coincided with the third anniversary of the National Education Policy (NEP) 2020. PM Modi also viewed the exhibition showcased on the occasion. At the exhibition, he interacted with a group of young kids, who appeared to be four to five years old. It wasn’t long before PM Modi shared a clip of his interaction with the children.
We also found a report about this on the website of PIB.
The Ministry of Education had posted about the event and pictures from the same while meeting the children.
We found the video of his interaction with the children on the YouTube channel, Zee News English.
In the entire video, none of the children used the term ‘vote chori’.
The child he was holding hands with just went on to repeat that he had seen him on TV and then hugged PM Modi.
We also found the video on the X (formerly Twitter) handle of Prime Minister Narendra Modi on July 29, 2023.
The term ‘vote chori’ was not heard during the entire conversation with the children.
Conclusion: Viral video of Prime Minister Narendra Modi seen with children, where children were heard calling him out for ‘vote chori’, is manipulated and old. The video was edited. The viral video and the claim are fake.
