Even though the Aam Aadmi Party accuses BJP of lying and using “photoshop” to create confusion and misinformation among voters, increasingly AAP is using the same strategy to win the upcoming assembly elections in Delhi.
It all started with AAP projecting BJP leader Jagdish Mukhi as the BJP’s Chief Ministerial candidate for Delhi even though BJP had not made any such announcement.
AAP even put posters in Delhi projecting Mukhi as BJP’s Chief Ministerial candidate – a step that was called “childish” by Mukhi, who also mulled taking legal action against the party.
However, in absence of BJP taking any legal action, it appears that AAP has become emboldened and decided to extend this strategy in other fields, especially on social media.
This strategy was used when a picture of Arvind Kejriwal sitting in the business class of an aircraft was released a couple of weeks ago. At that time some AAP supporters themselves photoshopped a picture and falsely claimed that the photoshop was done by BJP to defame Kejriwal.
Following is one such tweet that shows AAP using “false flag operation” as a strategy:
Feku Photoshop ka ek aur kaarnaama. Defaming #MufflerMan using another’s pic. pic.twitter.com/b9cJiBxPJM
— AAPIST (@aapist) December 5, 2014
Such false claims about BJP photoshopping picture was made even when AAP’s official website had put “Modi for PM, Kejriwal for CM” banner.
Later, both the business class photo of Kejriwal, as well as the official website showing pro-Modi banner, was accepted by AAP leadership as being genuine cases, but not before hordes of AAP supporters on social media claimed it to be a photoshop work by BJP.
OpIndia.com would like to make it clear that BJP is no saint in such cases and their supporters have also been caught using photoshopped images to make wrong claims, but such acts appear hypocritical when AAP, which claims to indulge in “clean politics”, does it in such blatant manner.
One of the popular incidents where a prominent BJP supporter was found circulating fake and photoshopped picture was when Priti Gandhi, a BJP worker from Mumbai, tweeted a poster that showed WikiLeaks founder Julian Assange endorsed Narendra Modi’s credentials as “incorruptible”.
WikiLeaks had officially issued a clarification earlier this year claiming that the poster was fake. BJP had to suffer embarrassment over the episode. Priti had accepted her mistake then.
But in the latest episode, Priti Gandhi herself appears to be a victim of fabricated and fudged poster created by AAP supporters.
Following tweet is being circulated on social media with help of AAP and Congress supporters. The poster claims to prove that Priti did a U-turn on the issue of insurance bill:
साला इन भूतनी वालो का कोई दीन ईमान है कि नहीं। What a Joker Party BJP is. Making fool of itself. Just c it pic.twitter.com/rCE5sABfJ2
— AK4PublicMovement (@fdi_r) December 22, 2014
However, when OpIndia.com decided to find the truth of it, we found that it was a case of misrepresentation of facts to make it appear that Priti had earlier tweeted against the insurance bill.
The context of the first tweet in the poster can be found by clicking here, and it is very apparent that Priti was referring to insurance policies for retired individuals and not about the bill about FDI in insurance.
One can say that karma has caught with Priti, but it doesn’t justify fabrication of facts by AAP supporters to prove a political point. It is no secret that both Congress and BJP are making U-turns on earlier issues and one doesn’t need to fudge data or misrepresent facts to prove it.
It is really unfortunate that every party is now using such tactics, making every one of them very unreliable. It is high time that top leadership of parties give clear instructions to their supporters and workers to practice “clean politics” in reality, not just in slogans.
