Ashwini Vaishnaw Calls Out Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg For Claiming NDA Lost Polls

Indian Union Minister of Railways Ashwini Vaishnaw called out Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg on Monday for erroneously stating that the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP)-led National Democratic Alliance (NDA) failed to get re-elected in the 2024 Lok Sabha elections.

Speaking on Joe Rogan's podcast episode published on January 10, 2025, Zuckerberg stated that every country that went to polls in 2024, including India, rejected their incumbent leaders, and chose new regimes.

The Meta founder made this statement while discussing public dissatisfaction around the world against their incumbent governments during the COVID-19 pandemic.

"2024 was a big election year around the world. All these countries, like India, had elections. The incumbents basically lost every single one. There is some sort of a global phenomenon – whether it was because of inflation or the economic policies to deal with Covid or just how the governments dealt with Covid- seems to have had this effect that's global," the Meta founder said.

This can be heard on the latest episode of Rogan's show, at the 17:39 mark.

"Factually Incorrect"

Vaishnaw followed with a rebuttal on Monday, calling Zuckerberg's claim of "most incumbent governments, including India in 2024 elections," losing post-COVID as "factually incorrect."

The 2024 Indian general elections ended with the incumbent BJP coming back to power with its NDA allies with 293 parliamentary seats - well over the 272 seats required to form a majority. This is despite the government being weakened from its two previous terms, due to BJP losing its majority position in the lower house, and having to rely on its allies to form a coalition government.

These figures can be further verified on the official website of the Election Commission of India.

Furthermore, according to election watchdogs, India was one of the only few countries to go polls in 2024, where the incumbent regime managed to stay in power with a coalition, along with countries like Japan and South Africa.