Misleading: Amit Shah criticized the BJP government over farmer suicides and lack of basic facilities for the poor.

By: Ishita Goel
September 26 2022

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Context:

A 13-second long video clip of Union Home Minister Amit Shah addressing the audience from the podium is viral on social media. In the video, we can hear the Indian politician questioning the country’s leadership about power and water cuts, the lack of hospitals in rural area, unemployment among the youth, and suicides among the farmers. A caption from a Twitter post (originally shared in Hindi) sharing the video said, "Amit Shah has also started questioning the Modi government. Will the Modi government answer their questions?" 

In fact:

The viral video is just a part of an address delivered by the Home Minsiter and doesn't clearly show who Amit Shah is talking about. Shah's full speech was posted on the Bharatiya Janata Party's(BJP) official YouTube channel on April 18, 2018. The video is about 56-minute long and its description read, "Shri Amit Shah addresses Shakthi Kendra Pramukhs of 28 assembly constituencies of Bengaluru division." Amit Shah speaks in Hindi about the former president of the Indian National Congress Rahul Gandhi, and former Chief Minister of Karnataka Siddaramaiah. As per the description on YouTube, BJP’s event was held when the Congress was in power in Karnataka and Siddaramaiah was at the helm. Shah points out some of the critical issues reportedly addressed by the BJP-led central government in Karnataka under the leadership of Prime Minister Narendra Modi. Amit Shah argued that he could give a report. He can also be seen challenging the then Karnataka government to show such a report to the people. The particular clipping shared via Twitter was taken when Shah spoke about the usage of funds released by the 13 and 14th finance commission. He can be heard saying "the farmer suicides and lack of basic facilities for the poor" and lashing out at the Congress government in Karnataka. The minister makes other accusations as mentioned in the Twitter post but does not mention that they are directed at the BJP government in the centre.

Farmer suicides in Karnatka has been a major issue in the state as the region reports one of the highest number of such cases in the country after states like Maharashtra. Quoting data from the National Crimes Record Bureau, The News Minute had reported that Karnataka witnessed as many as 2,405 farmer suicides in 2018 (the second-highest figure int the country).

The Indian Express had reported at the time that during the party’s campaign rallies in April 2018 Shah, was expecting a high success rate in Bengaluru in the assembly elections. During the meeting, he reviewed all the tasks set for the forthcoming elections in 2018. The results resulted in a hung assembly with BJP emerging as the largest party, while BS Yeddyurappa took oath as the Chief Minister of Karnataka, the Congress-Janta Dal (Secular) alliance proved majority in the house soon and formed the government for over 14 months before being toppled by the BJP.

It is evident that Amit Shah was not criticizing the Narendra Modi-led NDA government. But instead, the clipping was from 2018, when he criticized the Karnataka government in the build-up to the state assembly elections in Karnataka. With the Janata Dal-United under Nitish Kumar severed ties with the BJP to form a new coalition government in Bihar, and with Gujarat (Shah and PM Narendra Modi's home state) set for assembly elections, there have been several unwarranted narratives spreading online. 

The verdict:

Amit Shah did not speak against the Modi government in the viral video. A clipping of Amit Shah from 2018 criticizing the Siddaramaiah-led Congress government in Karnataka is shared with an insccurate narrative. Hence, we have marked this claim misleading.