An old video of United Kingdom Prime Minister Rishi Sunak has been shared on social media platforms misleadingly claiming that he offered prayers to a cow after becoming the prime minister.
Sunak and his wife Akshata Murty, in the video, can be seen offering aarti to a cow standing inside an enclosure. The couple follows instructions of a priest standing beside them to perform the rituals.
BOOM found the video is from August this year when Rishi Sunak was campaigning for the prime ministerial candidacy within the Conservative party in the UK.
Indian descent Sunak became third prime minister for the UK this year on October 25, 2022 amid a situation of economic crisis. The development took place immediately after his former Liz Truss resigned from the prime ministerial position serving for less than two months.
The video is being shared with a Hindi caption which translates to, "Indian native Rishi Sunak worshiped a cow after becoming the Prime Minister of Britain. His wife was also present there at that time. This is called as culture."
(Original Text in Hindi: भारतीय मूल निवासी ऋषि सुनक ने ब्रिटेन के प्रधानमंत्री पद पर विराजमान होने के बाद की गाय की पूजा , इस दौरान उनकी धर्म पत्नी भी रही साथ इसे कहते है संस्कृति)
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BOOM also received the video on its WhatsApp tipline number (77009 06588) with a verification request.
Fact Check
BOOM first performed a keyword search for 'Rishi Sunak Cow Worship' to check news reports about the incident. The search led us to multiple news reports from August 2022 carrying the same video.
The same video was uploaded on Brut India's official Instagram profile on August 26, 2022.
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The video description states, "Rishi Sunak and wife Akshata Murthy offered gau pooja [cow worship] at England's Bhaktivedanta Manor temple. In the 2011 census, more than 800,000 residents of England and Wales identified themselves as Hindus."
We then searched for posts on the Facebook page of Bhaktivedanta Manor temple and found a set of photos of Rishi Sunak were uploaded on August 18, 2022. Sunak and his wife can be seen posing with the cow in one of those pictures.
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The post mentions that Rishi Sunak and his wife visited Bhaktivedanta Manor in Hertfordshire, near London on August 18 to attend the Janmashtami festival. Sunak too uploaded some photos of the visit on his official Instagram profile on the same day.
He wrote, "Today I visited the Bhaktivedanta Manor temple with my wife Akshata to celebrate Janmashtami, in advance of the popular Hindu festival celebrating Lord Krishna's birthday."
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