Fact check: Video does not show G20 foreign delegates eating Indian style

A video of people enjoying a feast on banana leaves in traditional Indian style is being widely shared on the Internet. BJP leader, Adesh Gupta, shared the video, claiming it shows foreign delegates, who have come to India for a G20 meeting, enjoying an Indian meal.

He captioned the video, “The enjoyment of Indian culture and indigenous cuisine is unique. Many thanks to Modi Ji. Even those who eat with these knives and forks have been taught to eat with their straight hands. The foreign guests who came to India for the G20 meeting are enjoying food.”

The video was also shared by other Twitter users claiming the same. (Click here and here to see more posts.)

Fact Check

NewsMeter found that the feast was hosted by the Tamil-Canadian community in Waterloo, Canada. On performing a reverse image search of the video’s keyframe, we found it posted by the Facebook account Tamil Culture Waterloo Region on January 15. As per the caption, the video shows the Tamil Thai Pongal celebration attended by Waterloo politicians, Regional Chair City Mayors, Police Chief, and councillors.

Berry Vrbanovic, Mayor of Kitchener, tweeted several photos on January 16 and said that he had a wonderful time with community leaders and the local Tamil-Canadian community while celebrating Thai Pongal.

Kitchener is one of three cities that make up the Regional Municipality of Waterloo. In another tweet, Vrbanovic also tweeted a photo of him enjoying the feast.

Finally, we compared the photo of Vrbanovic enjoying the feast with one of the stills from the viral video and found that the viral video also shows Vrbanovic enjoying the feast.

Hence, we conclude that the viral video does not show foreign delegates of the G20 meeting enjoying meals in India. The claim is false.