On Thursday, January 19, a portal named South Asian Journal took to Twitter to share a clip from PM Modi’s old interview as Gujarat Chief Minister. The portal used a 0.11-second excerpt from Modi’s interview where he was speaking in Gujarati to further its anti-Modi agenda.
The magazine misconstrued Modi’s comments in the video, implying that he made a sexist remark against women, a blatant lie which was soon exposed by some alert Gujarati-speaking Twitter users.
“Modi’s misogynistic remarks against women caught on camera #BBC,” the caption on the video shared by South Asian Journal on January 19 read. The magazine quoted Modi as saying in the interview, “The World has come a long way but women still haven’t got any brain.”
Modi misogynistic remarks against women caught in camera pic.twitter.com/AjXR2oEovZ #BBC
— South Asian Journal (@sajournal1) January 18, 2023
However, the South Asian Journal’s attempt to denigrate Modi by twisting his interview was quickly exposed by social media users.
Janki, a Twitter user, deconstructed what Modi said in Gujarati during the interview, which the magazine maliciously labelled as a “misogynistic” remark against women.
Replying to South Asian Journal, Janki tweeted, “SPREADING FAKE NEWS – Modi ji here says in Gujarati “Duniya kya ni kya pahochi gayi, October mahino aayo j nathi.” Meaning- World has reached where from where, Duniya kaha se kaha pahoch gayi, October mahina abhi tak aaya nahi. Nothing about women or misogynist has been said by him here.”
SPREADING FAKE NEWS – Modi ji here says in Gujarati “Duniya kya ni kya pahochi gayi, October mahino aayo j nathi.” Meaning- Duniya kaha se kaha pahoch gayi, October mahina abhi tak aaya nahi.
— Janki (@jaankiii_) January 19, 2023
Nothing about women or misogynist has been said by him here. https://t.co/76tsMB73dm
Another user tweeted, “Translation : He is saying, the world has gone from where to where but October month hasn’t come yet – It’s a sarcasm btw and he isn’t disrespecting any woman!! Stop your crap!!”
Translation : He is saying, the world has gone from where to where but October month hasn’t come yet – It’s a sarcasm btw and he isn’t disrespecting any woman!! Stop your crap!!
— NM (@nitin_malkan2) January 19, 2023
So basically, Modi remarked in jest, “The world has come a long way, however, October is yet to arrive,” which the magazine conveniently misinterpreted as “The World has come a long way, but women still don’t have any brain,” in order to depict Modi as misogynistic and sexist.
It’s worth noting here how the leftist magazine cherry-picked a section of the interview in which Modi was seen turning around and chuckling at someone when passing the sarcastic remark to build the narrative that he has no regard for women and was ridiculing them while passing the remark. The truth, however, is that Modi made an innocuous comment in jest, which is why he chuckled after stating what he did.
South Asian Journal, interestingly, used the hashtag #BBC in its caption, a pretty clear indication that it was attempting to offer support to BBC’s latest hitjob against PM Modi, which India sharply condemned, calling it a “propaganda piece” aimed to peddle a discredited narrative.
Not only India, in fact, British Prime Minister Rishi Sunak had also dismissed the villainous portrayal of PM Modi in the controversial BBC documentary series on him.
Recently, UK’s National broadcaster BBC aired a two-part series attacking PM Narendra Modi’s tenure as Gujarat Chief Minister during the Gujarat riots of 2002. The documentary tried to question whether the Godhra carnage was actually an attack by Muslims, and repeated claims by Teesta Setalvad, Sanjiv Bhatt and many others about the Gujarat riots, which have been termed as lies by the Supreme Court of India. The documentary sparked outrage and was removed from select platforms.
South Asian Journal sought to do the same by misquoting Modi in an interview he did while he was Gujarat’s chief minister in order to back BBC’s ugly propaganda against Modi.
It is notable that while the portal is named South Asian Journal, its main focus is on India. While it follows accounts of several media houses on Twitter, it also follows openly anti-India persons and organisations like Rana Ayyub, Indian American Muslim Council, Hindutva Watch etc, apart from some Muslim groups.
While the about us page on its website says ‘South Asian Journal is a portal dedicated to news and events concerning the South Asian Diaspora Community,’ the website has no information on its editors, or who runs it.
