Yesterday, Aam Aadmi Party’s Arvind Jha Tweeted a July 2017 article from NDTV titled “Thailand Approves $5.5 Billion Bullet Train Project With China” casting aspersions on the Ahmedabad-Mumbai bullet train, the cost of which is pegged at about $17 billion.
Thai bullet train: 3000 km, $5.5 billion
Indian bullet train: 500 km, $ 17 billion
What’s up India?? https://t.co/tQ3AdZEQUq
— Arvind Jha (@jalajboy) October 1, 2017
The same was promptly retweeted by Delhi Chief Minister and AAP chief Arvind Kejriwal. Kejriwal, who in the past posted fake news on EVM tampering and demonetization drive and re-tweeted unsubstantiated stories of “IB report” on Punjab elections, is a champion in spreading rumours. Kejriwal had been against the bullet train project, and once he claimed, using some weird calculations, that a ticket of bullet train will cost 75,000 rupees.
Meanwhile, others piggybacked on the same and chimed in with their comments.
Thailand approves 3000 KM Chinese bullet train from Bangkok to China for $5.5B. India approves 500KM train for $17B!https://t.co/NnyTGXU5zl
— Prashant Bhushan (@pbhushan1) October 2, 2017
जिसने गरीबी देखी हो वो 50 रु फालतू खर्च होने पर पछताता है
पर साहब देश का 1600 करोड़ डॉलर नुकसान कर भी जश्न मना रहे https://t.co/LvkX9nO2u3— Jarnail Singh (@JarnailSinghAAP) October 1, 2017
But let us take you to where it all started. Hate monger, anti-Modi disgraced cop Sanjiv Bhatt, had tweeted this on 27th September,
Thailand: 300 km Bangkok-China Bullet Train for 5.5 billion US$
India: 500 km Mumbai-Ahmedabad Bullet Train for 17 billion US$
Go figure…— Sanjiv Bhatt (IPS) (@sanjivbhatt) September 27, 2017
Here, Bhatt, speaks of the 300 km stretch, which AAP leader Arvind Jha took up as 3,000 km and Prashant Bhushan, who has in the past tweeted fake news and images of BHU protests, also copied and pasted the message.
This makes it look like Bhatt’s ‘joke’ went on WhatsApp, which got edited by some mischief monger and got circulated on Twitter again, by the man who handles Aam Aadmi Party’s social media and communication, Arvind Jha.
The Tweet of Jha was then picked up by Congress leader Sanjay Jha, who added his own mathematics to it.
Just 300% more. Why? https://t.co/q4LEUfgOgO
— Sanjay Jha (@JhaSanjay) October 2, 2017
None of them bothered to check the facts. As per this report, the construction of the said bullet train link between Bangkok to the northeastern province of Nakhon Ratchasima, a distance of more than 250km, will start later this year and is scheduled for completion in 2021. The same will run at a speed of 250 km/hour and estimated cost for the same comes to about $5.1 billion dollars.
On the other hand, Ahmedabad-Mumbai bullet train will run at a speed of 320 km/hour and total cost of building the 508 km network is estimated at $17 billion.
These are the glaring discrepancies which these people deliberately chose to ignore. Makes you wonder which WhatsApp group was activated to spread misinformation. Or perhaps that’s a sign the elections are up in BJP ruled Gujarat.
Gujarat elections are coming? pic.twitter.com/yIroZEv0ws
— Udta Kabootar? (@sachya2002) October 2, 2017
Finally, some sense and shame prevailed and at least one of the rumor mongers, Prashant Bhushan apologised for spreading lies and propaganda, but he did not delete his original tweet containing the lie:
On further research, it seems that $5.5B may be for the 1st phase of this train track of only 256KM length. My apologies https://t.co/L5HZmYWhqE
— Prashant Bhushan (@pbhushan1) October 2, 2017
