Clip of Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah quoting Yediyurappa misattributed as his own words

By: Praveen Kumar
December 22 2023

Share Article:

An edited video of Siddaramaiah talking about Yediyurappa’s alleged response to farm loan waivers during the BJP administration has been shared on social media claiming to be Siddaramaiah’s own words about the waivers in current times. (Source: X/Screenshot/Modified by Logically Facts)

What is the claim?

A 13-second video clip shows Karnataka Chief Minister Siddaramaiah speaking in Kannada, “From where do we bring the money? We might have promised something during the elections. Does that mean we can fulfill those promises?” This clip has been widely circulated online. Social media users are sharing the video, claiming that the Karnataka CM, a member of the Congress party, admitted there's no money to fulfill election promises. Archived versions of such posts on various platforms can be accessed here, here, and here.

Telangana's former Minister of Information Technology, K. T. Rama Rao (KTR), also shared the video on X on December 19 with a caption questioning whether this would become a future template for Telangana, accusing Karnataka's CM of hoodwinking voters and questioning the lack of research and planning before making such statements (archived here). 

RTV News Network, a Telugu news website, also published an article with the same claim (archived here).

This claim about the Karnataka CM has been widely shared among the Telugu audiences as well. (Source: X/Screenshots)

However, it turns out that Siddaramaiah was quoting former CM Yediyurappa, and the statement has been taken out of context.

What we found

Our investigation revealed that the viral clip was cropped before being shared. We found the full version in an eight-minute video uploaded to YouTube by YoYo News Kannada on December 16, 2023. In the unedited video, Deputy CM D. K. Shivakumar is partially visible. The video is titled “Siddaramaiah Slams BS Yediyurappa | Karnataka Assembly | Belagavi Winter Session.”

Taking a cue from this, we watched the official video of the 2023 Karnataka Assembly winter session, held at Suvarna Vidhana Soudha in Belagavi on December 15. This over 5.5-hour-long video is available on Webcast, the government's video portal. The viral clip appears at the 4:29:38 timestamp.

Comparison of the cropped viral video and the original video by Webcast. (Source: X/Webcast/Screenshots/Modified by Logically Facts)

What was the context behind Siddaramaiah's statement?

At the winter session, Siddaramaiah referenced a statement by Karnataka's ex-Chief Minister B.S. Yediyurappa (BJP), who had threatened to organize protest rallies if the government did not waive loans. The Hindu and Deccan Herald reported on this statement at a farmers' rally in Belagavi on December 13, 2023. In Karnataka’s political history, such statements about loans typically refer to farm loans.

In the full video, Siddaramaiah mentions the BJP government's failure to waive loans during Yediyurappa's term in 2018, despite its manifesto promises. He recalls a December 2009 incident involving Yediyurappa and VS Ugrappa, a former MP from Bellary, Karnataka. Siddaramaiah claimed that in response to Ugrappa's question about loan waivers, Yediyurappa remarked, "Have we installed a note-printing machine? Where do we get the cash? Yes, we may have made some poll promises. Does that mean we can fulfill those promises?"

Logically Facts could not independently verify whether Yediyurappa explicitly said there was no money to fulfill election promises in 2009.

After the clip went viral, Siddaramaiah clarified on X and Facebook on December 18 that he was quoting Yediyurappa, not expressing his views.

It's worth noting here that Yediyurappa did make a similar remark in 2019, responding to flood victims in Shivamogga who were demanding relief, according to a report by The New Indian Express.

The full video of the 2023 Karnataka Assembly winter session clearly shows that Siddaramaiah was attributing the remarks in the viral video to former CM Yediyurappa, not stating them as his own. The cropping of the video omits this context.

The verdict

An edited video of Karnataka CM Siddaramaiah, in which he quotes former CM Yediyurappa, has been taken out of context and wrongly attributed to Siddaramaiah himself. Therefore, we have marked this claim as misleading.