Viral video of Rahul Gandhi’s comment on Ramayana is clipped

On Thursday, August 9, 2023, Congress leader Rahul Gandhi delivered a speech in Lok Sabha on the no-confidence motion against the Prime Minister Narendra Modi-led government in the backdrop of the current unrest in the northeastern Indian state of Manipur. Following this, a video clip of his speech is widely circulating on social media with a claim that it shows Gandhi making inaccurate remarks about the Ramayana in the Lok Sabha. 

A video shared on X (formerly Twitter) shows Lok Sabha Speaker Om Birla with Rahul Gandhi’s voice in the background saying, “Brothers and sisters, Hanuman didn’t set Lanka on fire” (translated from Hindi). The video has amassed over 1,53,000 views and over 500 reposts. Read the archived version here.

The video is being massively shared on X. (Source: X/@MrSinha/Altered by Logically Facts)

However, we have found that the viral video was clipped and was shared out of context.

In Fact

We looked for Rahul Gandhi’s speech on YouTube and came across a 31:04 long video uploaded on his official YouTube channel with the title “भाजपा ने मणिपुर में भारत माता की हत्या की है | Rahul Gandhi Full Parliament Speech” (BJP has murdered Mother India in Manipur | Rahul Gandhi Full Parliament Speech)." 

A longer version of Rahul Gandhi's speech is available on YouTube channel. (Source: YouTube/Rahul Gandhi)

The longer version provides the context in which Gandhi speaks about Ramayana. At around 29:57 minutes, Gandhi can be heard saying, “Ravana used to listen to two people, Meghnad and Kumbakaran. Similarly, Narendra Modi listens to two people, Amit Shah and Adani.” 

After this, he can be heard saying, “Hanuman didn’t set Lanka on fire. Lanka was set on fire because of Ravana’s ego.” Here, Birla interrupts Gandhi, but he goes on to say, “Ram didn't kill Ravana; Ravana's ego killed him.” By stating that Lanka was not set on fire by Hanuman and Ravana was not killed by Ram, Gandhi was not refuting these widely accepted beliefs, he was only drawing an analogy. 

Gandhi’s speech is also available on the official YouTube channel of Sansad TV. The 36:58 minute video titled “Rahul Gandhi's Remarks | Discussion on Motion of No-Confidence | 09 August, 2023” shows the viral clip at 35:30 timestamp. It further corroborates that the clip was shared out of context to claim that Gandhi made inaccurate remarks about the Ramayana in the Lok Sabha speech. 

The verdict

The longer version of Rahul Gandhi’s speech in Lok Sabha shows that the viral clip has been shared out of context to claim that he made an inaccurate remark about Ramayana. Therefore, we have marked this claim as misleading.