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PeakMetrics / Fact Checks

Politics & government fact checks

Explore claims publishers have checked about politics & government. Read their original ratings and follow the evidence.

12,753 published reviews in this topic

FACTLYPolitics & government

Video of PM Modi admitting to stealing in his childhood

Publisher’s rating: MISLEADING

The claim concerns a video presented as PM Modi admitting that he stole as a child. FACTLY says the clip came from his speech at a public meeting in Siliguri, West Bengal, on 10 April 2021, where he was telling a story about a robber. The review’s conclusion is that the excerpt was clipped so that the robber’s story could be mistaken for Modi’s own experience. (S1: “This video has been conveniently clipped from a longer speech by PM Modi in Siliguri, West Bengal on 10 April 2021 where he was narrating a story about a robber in the context of criticising TMC-led West Bengal government.”) The review describes two checks: reverse image searches of screenshots from the circulating video, and comparison with a longer video posted on Modi’s official YouTube channel. It reports that the official video was streamed live from the Siliguri public meeting on 10 April 2021. In the longer recording, Modi introduces the account as a story about “a big robber” who was sentenced to death, and then recounts the robber’s encounter with his mother. (S1: “When reverse image search was done on the screenshots of the video, a video uploaded by the official YouTube channel of Prime Minister Narendra Modi was found. The YouTube video was streamed live on 10 April 2021 from a public meeting in Siliguri at West Bengal.”; “Brothers and sisters when we were children, we all heard about the story about a big robber who was sentenced to death.”) The decisive context is the subject of the quoted passage: according to FACTLY’s account of the longer video, the robber—not Modi—is the person who says that his mother’s intervention when he was young might have stopped him becoming a robber. The review says the circulating post used a crop beginning at 40:39, omitting the setup that identifies the speaker in the story. It also places the anecdote in Modi’s criticism of the TMC-led West Bengal government. (S1: “The part from the 40.39 timestamp, where Modi is referring to the robber talking about his mother not stopping him from stealing during his childhood has been cropped and shared without context to give the impression that Modi is talking about himself.”; “The story was narrated by Modi when he was criticising West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee for ‘tolabaji’ (extortion)”)

Fact CrescendoPolitics & government

Claim: Fake news card shared that Dr Krishnasamy criticized MK Stalin

Publisher’s rating: False

The review investigates a social-media news card attributed to Thanthi TV that claimed Dr Krishnasamy had called Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin a madman. It identifies the alleged remarks as a response to Stalin referring to the central government as the “Union government” and says the card was shared by Venpura Saravanan on June 21, 2021. The review reports that the card was edited to look like Thanthi TV content, rather than being an authentic broadcast card. (The source describes the alleged wording as: “ஸ்டாலினுடைய தோற்றத்தை பார்த்தால் அறிவாளி போல் தான் தெரியும் ஆனால் உண்மையில் அவர் ஒரு பைத்தியக்காரன்.”)

Fact CrescendoPolitics & government

Claim: misinformation spreading that MK Stalin kept lemon in his convoy tyre

Publisher’s rating: False

The review investigated a social-media claim that lemons had been placed under the tyres of a car used by Tamil Nadu Chief Minister M.K. Stalin during his visit to Delhi. It says the image was being shared as evidence of that claim, and reports that the claim was incorrect: “மு.க.ஸ்டாலின் சென்றிருந்தபோது, கார் டயரில் எலுமிச்சை பழம் வைக்கப்பட்டதா என்றால், இல்லை என்பதே பதில்.” To establish the image’s provenance, the review identified New Generation Media’s Delhi reporter Niranjan Kumar as the photographer. It reports that Kumar said the lemon photograph was taken when Edappadi Palaniswami visited Delhi, not during Stalin’s visit, and that the image of Stalin’s visit was different. The review quotes Kumar’s post: “எடப்பாடியார் டெல்லி வந்திருந்தபோது எடுக்கப்பட்ட படம் இது.” The review also compared the vehicles’ registration numbers: the car in the lemon photograph was DL 9CT 5858, while the car used by Stalin in Delhi was DL 9C F 0900. It further notes that a photograph of Jayalalithaa was visible at the front of the car in the lemon image. On the basis of the photographer’s explanation and these image details, the review concluded that an older photograph from Palaniswami’s visit had been misattributed to Stalin.

Fact CrescendoPolitics & government

Claim: Parody tweet was misunderstood that Omar Abdullah criticized Congress Party

Publisher’s rating: False

The review investigates a social-media post claiming that Jammu and Kashmir National Conference leader Omar Abdullah criticized Congress for allegedly acting against India’s honour. The post presented the criticism alongside Abdullah’s name and photograph, and was shared on Facebook on June 21, 2021. The review notes a discrepancy in the name shown: the account was called “Farrago Abdullah,” rather than “Omar Abdullah.” To check the attribution, the publisher says it examined the Farrago Abdullah Twitter account and found the post under investigation there. The review reports that the account described itself as unofficial and fake. It also notes that the account’s handle, “@abdullah_0mar,” could lead people to mistake it for Abdullah’s account, despite the different display name. On that evidence, the review concludes the tweet was not a statement by Omar Abdullah: it was posted by an account that identified itself as unofficial and fake. The review therefore rejects the attribution of the Congress criticism to him. Its evidence addresses who published the tweet; the supplied excerpt does not establish who operated the account or independently document the account’s creation.

FACTLYPolitics & government

Pakistan PMO tweeted ‘Happy Father’s Day India’ and PM Modi replied ‘Thank you Beta’

Publisher’s rating: FALSE

The claim concerned a social-media image purporting to show Pakistan PMO wishing India a happy Father’s Day and Narendra Modi replying “Thank you Beta.” FACTLY reports that it checked whether the two accounts made those posts on Father’s Day and found no such tweets from their official Twitter accounts. The image was not evidence of an exchange by those officials: the review identifies a watermark belonging to the Instagram meme page comedyculture.in and says the same image appeared in one of that page’s Instagram statuses. The review also examined the account shown as @PakistanPMO in the image. It says this was not Pakistan’s official PMO account and that opening the handle showed it had been suspended by Twitter. Separately, the image’s timing was inconsistent: it showed an alleged post dated 20 June 2021 and a reply marked “4d,” which the review explains would mean four days before the screenshot was taken. Because the article was published on 21 June 2021, the displayed four-day interval did not fit that timeline. Together, the absence of posts from the official accounts, the meme-page watermark and matching Instagram status, the non-official suspended handle, and the implausible reply timing support the review’s conclusion that the image did not show the claimed official exchange.