Congress tweets morphed photo of Nirmala Sitharaman buying onions
The official handle of Maharashtra Congress Sevadal tweeted a photo of the Union minister buying onions from a vegetable vendor.
By Md Mahfooz Alam Published on 13 Oct 2022 1:03 PM GMT
Hyderabad: On 5 December 2019, Union finance minister Nirmala Sitharaman, while responding to a query of NCP MP Supriya Sule on the production and price of onion, said, "I do not eat a lot of onions and garlic. I come from a family where we don't care much for onions."
#WATCH: FM Sitharaman says "Main itna lehsun, pyaaz nahi khati hoon ji. Main aise pariwar se aati hoon jaha onion, pyaaz se matlab nahi rakhte" when an MP intervenes&asks her 'Aap pyaaz khaate hain?' while she was answering NCP's Supriya Sule's ques on production&price of onions. pic.twitter.com/i6OG7GN775
— ANI (@ANI) December 4, 2019
Against this backdrop, the official handle of Maharashtra Congress Sevadal tweeted a photo of the Union minister buying onions from a vegetable vendor.
The tweet read, "It was heard in the parliament that Nirmala Sitharaman does not eat onions." (Translated)
Maharashtra Congress Sevadal tweeted the photo a second time and wrote, "Are the onions for her neighbours." (Translated)
Click here to see the post.
Fact Check
NewsMeter ran a keyword search and found an article in The Hindu from 9 October which said that on the evening of 8 October, Nirmala Sitharaman went vegetable shopping on South Mada Street in Mylapore, Chennai. She bought Sundakkai (turkey berry), pidi karanai (wild yam), and five bunches of mulai keerai (a kind of amaranth), and manathakkali keerai (black night shade).
The official Twitter handle of the finance minister's office has posted several photos and a video of her vegetable shopping. In none of these photos, or the video, she is seen buying onions.
In the video, we noticed the frame around the 50-second mark which looks similar to the viral photo featuring the onions. On comparing the two, we found that she was buying wild yams. The photo has been digitally altered and onions added.
It is evident from the video posted by the office of the finance minister and The Hindu report that the minister did not buy onions while shopping for vegetables in Chennai. Hence, we conclude that the image doing the rounds is morphed and the claim is misleading.
