‘Nationalist’ channel Times Now has joined the rank of left-liberals in peddling the fake narrative that Hindus are forcing Muslims to chant Jai Shri Ram. They used a cropped video to accuse a BJP minister in Jharkhand of spreading hate in the name of Hindutva.

#Breaking | Jharkhand BJP mantri crosses line, spreads hatred in the name of ‘Hindutva’. More details by @scribe_prashant. pic.twitter.com/xR9nabu473 — TIMES NOW (@TimesNow) July 26, 2019

Reporting on an incident that happened outside Jharkhand assembly, Times Now alleges that minister CP Singh crossed the line when he forced Congress MLA Irfan Ansari to chant Jai Shri Ram. The same allegation with the same video clip was published by other media houses also, including the usual suspects who are expected to present such distorted news to peddle their agenda. All of them claimed that the BJP minister forced Ansari to chant Jai Shri Ram.

#NewsAlert – @BJP4India MLA & Jharkhand Minister CP Singh forces Cong MLA Imran Ansari to chant Jai Shri Ram after MLAs from both parties had a heated exchange inside the Jharkhand Assembly.@prabhakarjourno with details pic.twitter.com/aYkeVdZlf5 — News18 (@CNNnews18) July 26, 2019

From the video clip aired by the media houses, it can’t be denied that CP Singh did ask Ansari to chant Jai Shri Ram. But that is the half-truth, and media deliberately cropped the video of the full incident to present the BJP leader as the villain. The full video, which starts almost a minute before the video shared by media houses, shows that CP Singh was responding to the comments of the Congress MLA on Jai Shri Ram.

[youtube https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SGPk3f2o7-k]

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As we can see in the full video, while talking to a reporter, Irfan Ansari was saying that Jai Shri Ram belongs to everyone. It is not a property of Bharatiya Janata Party, Ram belongs to everyone, he said.

After that, the crew of the channel recording the interview ask CP Singh, who was standing nearby talking to someone, for his reaction to the comment of Ansari. They repeat the statement made by Ansari to him, as he didn’t hear the conversation. After listening to the same, he says, ‘of course, I am saying that Irfan bhai should chant loudly Jai Shri Ram’. After this he adds, your forefathers also belonged to Jai Shri Ram. He reminds Ansari that his previous generations were Hindus, and not the Mughal invaders.

This makes it clear that CP Singh asked Ansari to chant Jai Shri Ram because Ansari was claiming that Ram and the slogan belong to everyone, not just BJP. It was an on the spot reaction to the comment of Ansari. He did it to expose the hypocrisy of Ansari, who will say that Ram belongs to everyone in the country, but won’t chant Jai Shri Ram. ut the media houses published an edited video, removing the comment of Irfan Ansari which trigger the reaction by the BJP minister. Moreover, he had asked Ansari to chant Jai Shri Ram, not ‘forced’ him to do the same, as all the media houses are reporting.

It may be noted that Irfan Ansari didn’t object to the CP Singh asking him the chant Jai Shri Ram, in fact, he laughed it away by showing that he was having Hindu sacred thread on his wrist. He continues to argue that Ram belongs to everyone, and goes on to taunt the BJP leader for the ‘poor situation of Ram’ in Ayodhya.