Two unrelated videos showing the late Ratan Tata, chairman emeritus of Tata Group, are viral with a false claim that they show the last public appearances before his death.
Ratan Tata breathed his last on October 9, 2024 at Mumbai's Breach Candy Hospital. He was admitted to the hospital in a critical condition on October 7. The industrialist was 86.
BOOM found that both the viral videos do not show Ratan Tata's last public appearance before his death.
The first video has Tata being felicitated by Maharastra Chief Minister Eknath Shinde.
News agency ANI published the viral video falsely claiming, "Ratan Tata's last video goes viral as business tycoon takes last breath at 86."
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The video was misreported by other news outlets too including Zeenews, News9, Midday India, DNA India and NDTV Profit.
The second viral video shows Tata at an airport with his aide Shantanu Naidu and his security detail. It is being shared with the text, "Ratan Tata's LAST Video Before He Passed Away AT A Mumbai Hospital."
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Fact Check
BOOM found that both the viral videos are unrelated and are not Ratan Tata's last public appearances. We found several instances from 2024 where Tata made public appearances and also met with government officials at multiple occasions.
VIDEO 1 : Ratan Tata Felicitation Video
A reverse image search on a keyframe from the viral video showed several news outlets having published it in August 2023.
We found the exact video uploaded to YouTube by The Times of India on August 19, 2023 with the caption stating that Tata was conferred with the Udyog Ratna Award by the Mahrashtra government.
VIDEO 2 - Ratan Tata At The Airport
BOOM perused the viral video and noticed the date visible at the top of the arrivals board as 21/06/2024
We then ran a specific keyword search on Facebook and found the same video uploaded by a user on June 23, 2024.
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We found several instances from 2024 post the event for the Udyog Ratna award in 2023, where Tata made public appearances.
On March 20, 2024, the chief minister of Assam, Himanta Biswa Sarma met with Ratan Tata in Mumbai to thank him and the Tata Group for setting up a semi-conductor plant in the state in collaboration with the state government. The facility is reported to be the first indigenous facility for assembly and testing of semiconductor chips in the country and is set to greatly aid Assam's development.
Biswa posted photos from the meet on X showing Tata being felicitated by Sarma and others.
On May 20, 2024, news reports showed Tata at the voting centre in Colaba, Mumbai to cast his vote for the Lok Sabha Assembly elections. Several news channels including NDTV, TV9, Hindustan Times carried photos and videos of Tata casting his vote and later interacting with the media.
More recently on October 2, the Facebook page of the Press Information Bureau (PIB), the government's press wing, posted a video of Tata congratulating Prime Minister Narendra Modi on the occasion of the Swachh Bharat Mission completing ten years.
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