The Congress-left ecosystem has been trying to push its illusive conjecture of Facebook India being biased towards BJP and ‘journalist’ Swati Chaturvedi has become the latest to join the bandwagon. Taking to Twitter today, the self-proclaimed journalist, often known for her abusive rants on Twitter, shared an image of union minister Ravi Shankar Prasad with the senior Facebook India official Ankhi Das. She alluded that the minister met the Facebook official exclusively for a meeting.
In her attempt to push the canard being spread by the Congress and its loyalists, Swati Chaturvedi in her now-deleted Tweet, craftily cropped the real picture to suit her agenda. A Twitter user who was quick to identify this, shared Swati Chaturvedi’s Tweet alongside the real picture, from the commercial photography site Getty, to point out the journalist’s treachery.
Swati Chaturvedi crops photos to push her own agenda . She selectively crops photo to show Ravi Shankar Prasad exclusively meeting with Ankhi Das but he had a meeting with Facebook India team on July 3. pic.twitter.com/0KvSAXdzLY
— G U R U P R A S A D 🦁 (@KarnatakaSanghi) August 18, 2020
The truth was that the picture was taken when the Communication and Information and Technology Minister had met Facebook’s COO Sheryl Sandberg, it’s Global Public Policy Vice-President Marne Levine along with India Head of Public Policy Ankhi Das on July 3, 2020, in New Delhi. He had not met Ankhi Das alone, as alluded by Swati Chaturvedi.
False allegations being levelled at Facebook India and BJP government by the Congress ecosystem
This was nothing but Swati’s unsuccessful attempt to authenticate the recent false allegations being levelled at Facebook India and BJP government by the Congress ecosystem. After a report by WSJ dated August 14, alleged that officials of Facebook India were reluctant in taking steps against an alleged anti-Muslim post by a BJP linked account(s), the leftist media portals and liberals supported by the Congress ecosystem started using it to attack Facebook India and the BJP government.
Some users, including Nidhi, ex-journalist NDTV, left Facebook to mark protest. Congress leader Shashi Tharoor said in a tweet that he would raise the issue in front of the Parliamentary Committee. The leftist media portal, The Wire, went a step ahead to allege that Ankhi Das was a BJP supporter. Wayanad MP and former Congress President Rahul Gandhi had also posted a tweet supporting the claims made by the Wall Street Journal that Facebook is pro-BJP.
Swati Chaturvedi limits replies to her Tweet
After sharing the cropped image, Swati Chaturvedi also limited the reply on her official handle. By doing so she conveniently blocked Twitter users, apart from those who follow her or the ones she tagged in her Tweet from replying to her. When Twitter had announced this feature, many had expressed concerns that it will be used to spread misinformation and block correction, an apprehension which seems to be coming true.
The biggest weapon vs. misinformation on Twitter, of which there is A LOT of, is the ability for people to reply to a Tweet. It can be chaos, but allowing people to limit who can reply is dangerous & irresponsible.
— James Chen #BlackLivesMatter (@jchensor) May 21, 2020
Don’t yell into the void if you don’t want people yelling back.
Sharing cropped images or carefully edited videos, is a convenient tool which the leftist have used frequently to peddle fake news or their anti-BJP, anti-Hindu or anti-India narratives. Swati Chaturvedi herself had earlier tweeted a photoshopped image of Narendra Modi wearing an Arabic attire. On another occasion, she falsely claimed that Amit Shah was apparently sleeping in the Parliament. She has also been credibly accused of plagiarism and on another occasion, she sent OpIndia a defamation notice for reporting facts.
Safe saga of cropping, editing images and video by leftists
Besides, there are many other leftist media houses who have also shared such images and video to malign Modi government or shield Islamists. The Hindu, to help Rahul Gandhi in derailing the Rafale deal, had not only cropped the Rafale dissent note but also digitally manipulated it. ‘Nationalist’ channel Times Now had used a cropped video to accuse a BJP minister in Jharkhand of spreading hate in the name of Hindutva.
Moreover, the left-wing portal NDTV, while reporting the Delhi riots had carefully cropped images of the mosque to mislead the readers on the real nature of the anti-Hindu riots and tried to hide the images where it can be clearly seen that the local mosques had stored stones to attack the Hindus during the communal riots. The Indian Express cropped a photo of a skullcap to make the photo look secular. Self-proclaimed ‘fact-checking’ website AltNews’ co-founder Zubair had shared a cropped video claiming that some members VHP of Gonda, UP had raised some anti-national slogans. These are, however, just a few examples of selective journalism and misinformation
