Fact Check: Give Arunachal to China, suggests Army Chief Gen. Dwivedi? No, video is AI-manipulated

Hyderabad: A video showing Chief of Army Staff General Upendra Dwivedi making controversial remarks is going viral on social media.

This claim is circulating in the backdrop of heated diplomatic exchanges between India and China following an incident where an Indian passport-holding woman from Arunachal Pradesh was reportedly detained during transit at Shanghai Pudong Airport.

In the video, General Dwivedi could be heard allegedly saying, “In hindsight, when I look at global geopolitics and what has been happening to India, especially after the incidents of 6 and 7 May, and how superior Chinese technology led to the destruction of our Rafales, I am of the opinion that if we truly want to succeed against Pakistan, the best strategy would be to make friends with China. I heard about an incident recently where a girl from Arunachal went to China and was denied entry. I think we need to fix our relationship so that China stops interfering there with regard to Pakistan and stops weaponising Pakistan. This way, we can easily take it back, as Rajnath ji said. Besides this, the people of Arunachal do not associate themselves with India, so it wouldn’t be our loss.”

This video was shared on X (post withheld in India but accessible through a VPN) with the caption, “Breaking: Chief of Army Staff General Upendra Dwivedi comes with an out-of-the-box solution to fix the Pakistan military. He has proposed giving Arunachal to China in order to appease China to stop supporting Pakistan. Every word that Rahul Gandhi had said, comes out to be true. Narendar has surrendered. (sic)” (Archive)

Fact Check

NewsMeter found that the claim is false. The viral video is AI-manipulated.

Source of the video

We found that the video carries the logo of ‘The Tribune’ in its top left corner.

Using this information, we checked the official YouTube channel of The Tribune and found the same video showing Chief of Army Staff General Upendra Dwivedi. This video was uploaded on November 24 with the title ‘Indian Army Chief Gen Dwivedi Praises INS Mahe, Highlights Navy’s Anti-Submarine Dominance’.

This video has clips of General Dwivedi speaking at the commissioning ceremony of INS Mahe on the same day.

Upon analysis of both videos, it is clear that the viral clip was created using this footage. However, nowhere in the video does General Dwivedi make the controversial remarks as alleged by the clip.

A longer version of the video was livestreamed by Bharat Tak on YouTube on November 24. This shows the entire speech of General Dwivedi from the 29:40-minute mark to 35:24. Here, too, he is not seen making the viral remarks in the video.

This hinted that the video might have been manipulated. We analysed the video closely to find any proof of media tampering.

Analysis of video

Upon analysing the viral video, we found the speech pattern in the clip to be unlike that of General Dwivedi’s speech at the commissioning ceremony of INS Mahe.

We also found that at several places in the video, the body movements were repeated in a manner unnatural to the usual rhythm of a human body. This kind of ‘odd behaviour’ is common in videos manipulated using AI (Artificial Intelligence). More instances of video duplication can be seen on the NewsMeter channel with fact-check videos here.

We also contacted the Deepfakes Analysis Unit (DAU), an initiative of the Trusted Information Alliance (TIA), regarding the authenticity of the clip featuring General Dwivedi. DAU analysed the video using Hiya Audio Intelligence, which determined that the voice is generated or modified by AI. It also found that the audio has only a 29 per cent match with live human markers.

NewsMeter debunked several claims made using AI-manipulated videos. You can read the reports here and here.

Therefore, NewsMeter concludes that the viral claim is false. The viral video is AI-manipulated.