New Delhi: Today, Union Minister Ashwini Vaisnaw verified Mark Zuckerberg’s assertion regarding the outcome of the 2024 Lok Sabha Elections. Mr. Zuckerberg made the false assertion that the majority of incumbent governments, including India, lost elections in 2024 during an interview with well-known podcaster Joe Rogan on Friday.
“The assertion made by Mr. Zuckerberg “is factually false,” the Union Minister for Information and Broadcasting stated.
The NDA administration, led by Prime Minister Narendra Modi, emerged victorious in the general elections of 2024.
Reprimanding Mr. Zuckerberg, Mr. Vaishnaw wrote on X: “India, the largest democracy in the world, held elections in 2024 with more than 640 million votes. The Indian populace reiterated their faith in the PM-led NDA.
In an attempt to emphasize how the COVID-19 epidemic affected elections and caused a worldwide decline in public faith in governments, Mr. Zuckerberg stated, “2024 was a very big election year around the world and all these countries, India, had elections.” All of them were essentially lost by the incumbents. Whether it was due to inflation, the economic measures taken to combat COVID, or simply the way governments handled the virus, there is a worldwide phenomena of some kind. It appears to have had a worldwide impact.In contrast to Mr. Zuckerberg, the Union Minister stated that “PM Modi’s resounding third-term victory is a testament to good governance and public trust.”
As the world’s largest democracy, India conducted the 2024 elections with over 640 million voters. People of India reaffirmed their trust in NDA led by PM @narendramodi Ji’s leadership.
— Ashwini Vaishnaw (@AshwiniVaishnaw) January 13, 2025
Mr. Zuckerberg’s claim that most incumbent governments, including India in 2024 elections,…
The move, which was generally perceived as an attempt to win over President-elect Donald Trump, whose conservative base has been protesting that fact-checking on tech platforms is a way to restrict free speech, caused panic when it was announced.
The action was deemed “really shameful” by US President Joe Biden, and a global network issued a warning of “devastating consequences” should the tech giant expand its strategy to other nations.
In an open letter to Zuckerberg, the International Fact-Checking Network stated that “some of these countries are highly vulnerable to misinformation that spurs political instability, election interference, mob violence, and even genocide.”
In the interview, Zuckerberg defended the choice by drawing a comparison between the fact-checking software and “something out of 1984,” a reference to George Orwell’s Orwellian novel.
