BJP continues to hoodwink EC; NaMo TV airs fake news on houses built under UPA regime

NaMo TV, the controversial news channel being used as a propaganda arm of the Bharatiya Janata Party, has been airing at least one documentary propagating fake information about the number of houses built during the United Progressive Alliance (UPA) regime.

A recorded documentary of NaMo TV, which was being aired in Delhi at least until Monday evening, showed the anchor as saying that the previous United Progressive Alliance (UPA) government had constructed just 25 lakh houses during the final four years of their tenure till 2013-14, compared to 1.25 crore homes built by the Modi government in its first four years starting 2014.

The parroted claim, first stated by PM Modi during a rally in Shirdi in Maharashtra on October 19, 2018, has been found out to be entirely off the mark.

Several fact-checking websites had after the PM’s claim cited data from various government websites to reach the conclusion that at least 89.65 lakh houses had been built by the Congress-led government in their last four years, almost 3.5 times higher than the number cited by the PM.

However, the debunking of PM’s claims by independent fact-checkers has failed to dissuade NaMo TV from airing false figures during the crucial election period.

BJP wrote to EC last week

What’s more brazen on part of the BJP and NaMo TV is that the the documentary with misleading information continues to be on air despite the saffron party assuring the Election Commission last week that all the “documentary content” from the political advertising platform had been removed.

News agency Press Trust of India (PTI) had reported on Saturday that the BJP had told the EC that it won’t run any content that was "not certified" or "returned" by the media certification and monitoring committee (MCMC).

The Chief Electoral Officer of Delhi as well as the Media Certification and Monitoring Committee have been reached out for a comment. The story will be updated as and when there is a response.

After mysteriously appearing on DTH platforms on March 31, NaMo TV had been accused of violation the Model Code of Conduct by Congress and Aam Aadmi Party (AAP).

The Delhi Chief Electoral Officer, on being asked by the EC if permission was sought by backers of NaMo TV before they went on air, had responded that no pre-approval had been sought by the BJP.