Newspaper Clipping Carries Tweet Falsely Attributed to Sweta Singh

Singh took to Twitter to call out the clipping as fake, adding that it was probably taken from a parody account.

Singh took to Twitter on the morning of 22 January to call out the clipping as fake, adding that it was probably taken from a parody account

(Photo: Altered by The Quint)

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CLAIM

A newspaper clipping doing the rounds on social media says Aaj Tak news anchor Sweta Singh had lashed out at the Mahagathbandhan rally over the lack of 'vande mataram' and 'Bharat mata ki jai' chants.

The clipping, headlined 'Aaj ka tweet' claims Singh, on Twitter, had said:

"इतनी बड़ी रैली हुई देश के सभी बड़े बड़े नेता थे किन्तु कान तरस गए भारत माता की जय और वन्दे मातरम सुनने के लिए | फिर यह बेशरम लोग किस मुंह से देशित में एक होने का दवा कर रहे हैं |" (Translated: Such a big a rally was held with so many big leaders, my ears were waiting to hear the chants of 'vande mataram' and 'Bharat Mata ki jai'. With what face are these people claiming to join forces in the name of 'national interest?')

(Photo Courtesy: Twitter/@SwetaSinghAT)

The clipping was also shared by the page 'Modi’fied 2019' on Facebook, albeit it had received little traction at the time of writing this article.

TRUE OR FALSE?

Singh took to Twitter on the morning of Tuesday, 22 January, to call out the clipping as fake, adding that it was probably taken from a parody account and had instead been attributed to her.

In her tweet, Singh stated that she had never said anything of the sort as the clipping said, she questioned the veractiy of the newspaper which carried the clipping. She also added that the claims made by the 'tweet' were also false, as at the end of the rally, slogans of 'Jai Hind' were raised.

Taking cue from Singh's statement, we found out that the newspaper had indeed appeared to have run a tweet from a parody account as Singh's actual statement.

The parody account clearly states that it is a 'fan and parody account', and has over 18.4k followers.

The Quint, however, was unable to independently identify the newspaper that has carried the tweet.

A PAID TREND, PERHAPS

Further, a search for random words from the falsely attributed tweet on Twitter throws up several users having tweeted the same, indicating that it could possibly have been a paid trend.

Screenshot from Twitter

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