By Hazel Gandhi
An old video of former Prime Minister Dr Manmohan Singh and Sonia Gandhi where they are seen exchanging seats at a party meeting is being shared with the false claim that Gandhi ordered Singh to switch seats despite him being the PM. BOOM found that the video is misleading, and the two were asked to switch seats by the Special Protection Group (SPG) after they mistakenly sat in the wrong seats.
The short clip shows an SPG official talking to Singh while he is seated and Gandhi is standing. Singh then gets up and Gandhi sits in his seat. The video is being shared with different captions, all of which indicate that Gandhi ordered Singh, who was PM at the time, to switch seats, and he obeyed. One caption reads, "Remot(e) controller will never know the real power of self reliant government. Congress is having burns because of Narendra Modi Ji's decisive power."
Click here to view the post and here for an archive.
Click here to view the tweet and here for an archive.
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FACT-CHECK
BOOM found that the viral claims are misleading, and Singh and Gandhi exchanged seats as per the directions of the SPG since they were sitting in the wrong seats.
A reverse image search of the video using keywords led us to a report by India TV published on December 14, 2011.
According to the report, Singh and Gandhi were sitting in the wrong seats and it was only after the intervention of the SPG that they realised they were not in their designated seats. The report also mentions that the SPG first informed Gandhi, who got up and waited for Singh to vacate the seat. According to India Today, this incident took place when Singh and Gandhi were attending a United Progressive Alliance (UPA) meeting at the former's New Delhi residence on December 13. They exchanged their seats and continued their meeting after this.
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