A 19-second video of Samajwadi Party leader Akhilesh Yadav has gone viral.
In the video, he can be heard allegedly praising Muslim League leader Muhammad Ali Jinnah for his capabilities as a barrister who brought people freedom from the British through relentless effort.
An X post shared the video with the caption, “Jinnah got us freedom, says Akhilesh Yadav.”
SouthCheck found that the claim was misleading. The clip has been edited. In the original video, Akhilesh also mentioned Sardar Patel, Mahatma Gandhi and Jawaharlal Nehru alongside Jinnah.
On searching with appropriate words, we found a video report by India Today published on November 1, 2021. It was titled, “SP Chief Akhilesh Yadav Calls Jinnah ‘A Hero Of India’s Freedom Movement’, Faces Major Backlash”.
The caption read: “Samajwadi Party (SP) President Akhilesh Yadav has stirred major controversy by glorifying Muhammad Ali Jinnah at a party rally in Hardoi. ‘Sardar Patel, Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and Jinnah, they all came out of the same institution. They all studied at the same institute, they became barristers and gave freedom,’ he said at the rally on Sunday.”
This hinted that the video was edited as there is no mention of the other leaders in the viral clip. While searching for the original speech footage of the SP leader, we found an X post by ANI Uttar Pradesh/Uttarakhand.
In the clip shared on October 31, 2021, Akhilesh Yadav could be heard saying, “Sardar Patel, Mahatma Gandhi, Jawaharlal Nehru and (Muhammad Ali) Jinnah studied in the same institute. They became barristers and managed to win people’s freedom.”
Similar to the India Today report, we found many news reports that published the backlash Akhilesh faced from BJP leaders for mentioning Jinnah alongside Indian freedom fighters.
Hence, we conclude that the claim is misleading since the viral video was edited to remove the other leaders mentioned by the SP president.
