A video that shows a person talking about the criminalisation of politics in India is going viral on social media with the claim that he is 'Shailaja Kant Misra', an IPS officer from Lucknow.
Social media users have shared the video, praising the person for speaking facts and highlighting the problems in the country's political, and electoral system. Sharing the video, people also claimed that it is the public's fault for letting these 'criminals' win elections.
However, we found that the video does not show Shailja Kant Misra speaking about the issues. The person in the clip is, in fact, Nitish Rajput, a digital content creator and entrepreneur. The video has been up on the internet since 2020 on his official YouTube channel.
While Misra, a former IPS officer, is currently serving as the Vice-Chairman of the Uttar Pradesh Braj Teerth Vikas Parishad.
Claim
The claim states that the speaker talking about the criminalisation of politics in the video is an IPS officer from Lucknow, Shailja Kant Misra. The clip has more than 434K views and was uploaded by writer Harinder S Sikka.
It was posted with a caption in Hindi that said, "कृपा हर देशवासी तक कड़वा सत्य पहुँचाए।आज़ादी के बाद से हम ग़ुलामों की तरह आपराधिक नेताओं को समर्पित हैं। इमर्जन्सी,ऑपरेशन ब्लूस्टार,1984 में सिखों की हत्या,गोदरा ट्रेन में हिंदुओं को ज़िंदा जलाना,दिल्ली में शराब पर छूट से पैसे कामना…? क़ुसूर हमारा है,हम नपुंसक हैं,नेता नहीं।"
(Translation: Kindly make this bitter truth reach every countryman. Since independence, we have been devoted to criminal leaders like slaves. Emergency, Operation Blue Star, the killing of Sikhs in 1984, the burning alive of Hindus in a train in Godhra in 2002, earning revenue from alcohol exemption in Delhi…? The fault is ours, we are impotent, not the leaders.)
An archive of the post can be found here
(Source: Twitter/Screenshot)
What About the Video?
At first, we noticed a social media handle, @nitishrajpute, floating over in different parts of the video. Taking this as a clue, we searched for the same on Google and found the official Instagram account.
The social media handle in the video led us to the official Instagram handle of the speaker.
(Source: The Quint/Screenshot)
We found that the speaker is a digital content creator and an entrepreneur, and not an IPS officer as claimed in the viral post. As it can be seen above, his name is Nitish Rajput and the Instagram bio underlines his profession.
Further, we checked his official YouTube channel and found the original video titled, "Why Criminals Win Elections." The clip was uploaded on 26 July 2020. This proves that an old clip with the IPS officer's name is being falsely shared.
Who is the IPS Officer?
Shailja Kant Misra is a retired IPS officer from the 1977 batch who currently serves as the Vice-Chairman of the Uttar Pradesh Braj Teerth Vikas Parishad.
The comparison clearly shows that both of them are different people.
(Source: Altered by The Quint)
A comparison between both images clearly shows that both are different people.
Evidently, a video which shows a YouTuber Nitish Rajput speaking about the criminalisation of politics in India is going viral with false claims.
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