A 6-year-old video of television anchor and journalist Rajdeep Sardesai being heckled by a crowd has been revived and shared on social media with false claims after the anchor's recent interview with bollywood actor Rhea Chakraborty.
BOOM found that the video was from 2014 when Sardesai was allegedly heckled by a group of NRIs who had turned up at the Madison Square, New York, on September 28 to hear Prime Minister Narendra Modi's speech. This was Modi's first trip to the United States after being elected as the Prime Minister in May of 2014.
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The video is viral in the backdrop of actor Rhea Chakraborty's exclusive interview to Sardesai on actor Sushant Singh Rajput's death. Ever since the interview was aired on August 27, 2020, social media has been abuzz with criticism of Sardesai and TV channel Aaj Tak which even made the hashtag #ShameOnAajtak trend on Twitter.
The 68-second-long viral video shows Sardesai enter into a heated argument with a man while a huge crowd of onlookers surround them. Moments later, the anchor pushes the other person and there is a brief altercation before they are separated.
A Hindi caption with the viral clip translates to 'Anchor Rajdeep Sardesai who interviewed Rhea Chakraborty thrashed by public'.
(Hindi: रिया चक्रवर्ती का इंटरव्यू लेने वाले आजतक के एंकर राजदीप को पब्लिक ने पीटा )
Click here for an archive of the post.
Archived versions of similar posts can be found here and here.
The video is viral on Twitter with similar captions. An archive of the post is available here.
रिया चक्रवर्ती का इंटरव्यू लेने वाला #आजतक के एंकर राजदीप को पब्लिक ने पीटा@sardesairajdeep 😀 pic.twitter.com/By5PT8h7Xw
— Gajindra Behera🇮🇳 (@GajindraBehera1) August 29, 2020
Similar archived tweets can be found here and here.
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The video has recently been uploaded on YouTube with a similar caption.
Most of these posts have been shared on August 28, a day after the interview of Chakraborty with Sardesai was aired.
Fact Check
A reverse image search on a key frame of the clip led us to the same video uploaded on YouTube channel 'News Hour India' on September 29, 2014. The video has been titled 'Rajdeep Sardesai fight: FULL VIDEO Rajdeep exposed New York.'
A keyword search with 'Rajdeep Sardesai' and 'New York' led us to articles that detailed the incident.
An NDTV article published on September 30, 2014, states that the incident took place before Prime Minister Narendra Modi was due to make an appearance at Madison Square on September 28, 2014. According to the report, Sardesai was there to interview Indian diaspora about their sentiments on seeing Modi before the big event.
The report further mentions that the TV anchor was reportedly heckled by the people who had gathered to listen to Modi's speech.
More articles about the event can be found here and here.
Looking closely at the video, the words 'square' and 'garden' are visible in one of the frames, which is similar to the signboard for Madison Square Garden in New York, where the incident took place in 2014.
BOOM also compared a few frames from the viral and original video and it was clear that the videos are one and same.
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This screenshot from the viral video is almost identical to the still from News Hour India's video uploaded in 2014.
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