Pictures Of Rahul Gandhi With Migrant Workers Peddled With False Claims

Social media posts alleging the Congress party roped in actors to play the part of stranded migrants speaking to Rahul Gandhi, are false.

Facebook posts - showing pictures of the former Congress president interacting with migrant workers - are being shared with captions claiming that the party enlisted 'fake migrants' for a photo-op with Gandhi. BOOM found the claims to be false.

Rahul Gandhi had on May 16, 2020 met with a group of migrant workers who were walking from Harayana to their homes in Jhansi (Uttar Pradesh). After interacting with them for nearly an hour, Gandhi had arranged for vehicles to drop the migrants to their homes. Read more about it here.

However, a set of two images from the meeting are being used to create a fake narrative around the incident.

One of the images in the post shows Gandhi listening to a migrant worker while a woman beside him looks on keenly. The second image shows the same woman sitting in a car. A Hindi caption with the post claims 'another scandal by Congress. Even the migrants who met 'Pappu' turned out to be actors. How much more will you fall, sycophants'.

(Hindi: कांग्रेस का एक और #घोटाला...पप्पू से मिलने वाले मजदुर भी नकली निकले ...चमचों और किस हद तक गिरोगे)

The post can be viewed below and its archived version can be accessed here.

The same set of images have been shared from multiple Twitter handles and Facebook pages with similar claims.

Also read 2019 Pic Peddled As Buses Organised By Priyanka Gandhi Vadra For Migrants

Fact Check

BOOM looked up Congress party's Twitter handle for the images. We found the same woman among other migrant workers in one of the images shared on May 16 from Congress' official Twitter handle.

We also found another set of four pictures tweeted by Uttar Pradesh Congress Committee chief Ajay Kumar Lallu. 

Lallu, in his tweet, says 'Rahul Gandhi met migrant labourers walking from Delhi's Ashram area towards MP and UP. He shared their pains. All of them have been sent home'.

In three of the pictures tweeted by Lallu, one can see the same woman whose photo has been shared in the viral post. In one of the pictures she can be seen sitting in a car along with another migrant worker. 

The incident had also been covered by several newspapers. As per media reports, Rahul Gandhi had met a group of migrant workers returning on foot from Harayana to UP and MP. After interacting with them for a while, Gandhi had asked members of the Delhi Pradesh Congress Committee to arrange vehicles to drop the migrants home. 

Wire agency ANI had also tweeted a set of four pictures of migrants sitting in cars waiting to be taken to their homes. The woman in the viral post can also be seen in the second picture tweeted by ANI.

Also read No, 'Pakistan Zindabad' Was Not Chanted In Mumbai

Several video reports about the incident show the same woman getting inside a car arranged by Congress workers. Watch the video below.