Old Video of Mamata Banerjee Shouting Revived Amid Shah’s WB Visit
TMC MLAs had ransacked the West Bengal Assembly after Mamata Banerjee was stopped from going to Singur in 2006.
advertisement
An old video of West Bengal Chief Minister Mamata Banerjee shouting, as the crowd chants ‘Vande Mataram,’ has been revived amid Home Minister Amit Shah’s visit to the state, ahead of the West Bengal 2021 polls, to claim that Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) has agitated the Trinamool Congress (TMC) chief.
However, the video is from November 2006, when Banerjee along with other MLAs had ransacked the West Bengal Assembly, because she was prevented from entering Singur to protest against the land acquisition.
CLAIM
The video is being shared with the claim, “बीजेपी वाले इसे पागल करके छोडेगें”
(Translation: “BJP will make sure she goes mad.”)
A user on Facebook shared the video with the caption, “Amit Shah tours Bengal, and Didi has a mental fit,” in Hindi, garnering over 5,100 views at the time of writing this article.
The Quint also received a query regarding the video on its WhatsApp helpline.
WHAT WE FOUND OUT
In the video, Banerjee can be heard saying, “They were beating us up... the party had called for a meeting with 19 Krishi-bachao committees... they aren’t letting me inside the Assembly,” in Bangla.
A relevant keyword search led us to a similar video from 2011, uploaded on YouTube with the caption, “Mamata Banerjee ransack the West Bengal Assembly.”
Clearly, the video is not recent, as claimed.
A further search led us to a news report dated 30 November 2006 in NDTV’s archives, which carried the same visuals.
The report states that Banerjee along with 30 MLAs had gone on a rampage at the West Bengal Assembly, furious about being held from going to Singur in a protest against the Left Front government’s decision to allow farmland acquisition for the TATA Motors’ factory.
Further, according to the Telegraph India’s report the BJP-led NDA and TMC had protested against then Chief Minister Buddhadeb Bhattacharjee, together.
“Rajnath (Singh) had no plans to venture into Singur. The change of plan was as much an attempt to establish his pro-farmer image as a bid to woo Mamata back to the NDA fold,” the report states.
The Quint’s WebQoof team had debunked the same video in 2019, when it had gone viral with the claim that Banerjee’s objection to Vande Matram chants had caused a ruckus. However, she raises no such objections in the video and can only be heard saying, “They are threatening me that they will not let me enter the Assembly.”
Evidently, an old 2006 video has been revived ahead of the 2021 West Bengal polls to make misleading claims.
(Not convinced of a post or information you came across online and want it verified? Send us the details on WhatsApp at 9643651818, or e-mail it to us at webqoof@thequint.com and we'll fact-check it for you. You can also read all our fact-checked stories here.)
(At The Quint, we question everything. Play an active role in shaping our journalism by becoming a member today.)