Sanjeeb Phuyal is the Nepali Editor of Newschecker based in Kathmandu, Nepal. He brings over a decade of experience writing and editing news. In his previous stint, he worked as online editor for The Kathmandu Post. With the growth of social media platforms—and the ever-growing competition amongst media outlets to churn out breaking news, he feels that fact-checking every piece of information has become more essential today than ever before.
Claim
Nepali Congress General Secretary Gagan Thapa bowed and apologised to Rastriya Swatantra Party Chairman Rabi Lamichhane.
Fact
No, the viral video shows Gagan Thapa speaking at the House.
A video allegedly showing Nepali Congress General Secretary Gagan Thapa apologising to Rastriya Swatantra Party Chairman Rabi Lamichhane is going viral on TikTok.
Former Home Minister and RSP Chairman Lamichhane was arrested on October 18 for his alleged involvement in cooperatives fraud and organised crime. A parliamentary special parliamentary committee alleged that he, as the managing director of the now-defunct Gorkha Media Network, was involved in misappropriating funds from multiple cooperatives.
Against this backdrop, TikTok user @theycallmesubash posted a video showing a speech by Nepali Congress General Secretary Gagan Thapa. In the 28.28-minute long video, Thapa says, “The Rastriya Swatantra Party has claimed that they will emerge as the largest political party in 2027 and sweep the Nepali Congress and CPN-UML. The incumbent government should make it clear about the current status of Bhutanese refugee scam investigation that was initiated by the previous government. The prime minister should not say that it won’t allow corruption to take place. Rather the government should assure the people through its actions that it won’t spare a single guilty person. The issue of Giribandhu Tea estate is being raised. The government should swing into action and take back the land. Our position is the same no matter whether we are in the right or left bench. We believe that the truth should prevail in all the scandals including the fake Bhutanese refugee case, Giri Bandhu tea estate land swap, dedicated and trunk lines to industries, and cooperative scam…” Text superimposed on the video reads, “Finally, Gagan Thapa bowed and apologized to Rabi Lamichhane. He yelled at KP Sharma Oli. The current alliance of Bhutani & Giribandhu is going to fall.” The video caption also reads the same.
The video also shows a different clip of Rabi Lamichhane being taken to court.
The video posted on December 29, 2024, has garnered 10.4k likes, 298 users have shared the video until the last count.
Newschecker found the claim to be misleading.
Fact Check /Verification
To check the veracity of the claim, Newschecker split the video into several key frames and ran reverse searches on them. A Google reverse search led us to a video, dated August 13, 2024, posted on the YouTube channel of AP1HD Television. On checking the video thoroughly, we found that the video showed Nepali Congress lawmaker Gagan Thapa speaking at the parliament about various scandals such as Bhutanese refugee scam, Giribandhu tea estate land swap, and cooperatives fraud. However, we didn’t find NC General Secretary Thapa apologising to Rabi Lamichhane. We also noticed that the video carried a logo of the House of Representatives on the top left corner.
The reverse search also led us to an article, carrying a photo of Gagan Thapa resembling the frame from the viral video. The article dated August 13, 2024, posted on the Hamrakura.com, was about Gagan Thapa’s proposal to amend the constitution to allow the party garnering 40 percent of votes to form the government.
Further, a reverse search on a frame showing RSP Chairman Rabi Lamichane being escorted by Nepal Police personnel led us to an article, dated November 14, posted on Khabarhub online. On digging further, we found a video, dated November 12, 2024 posted on the YouTube channel named Video Nepal. On checking the video, we found that the video showed a clip of Rabi Lamichhane being taken to the District Government Attorney’s Office in Rupandehi.
Thus, our findings clearly indicated that the viral video showed an old video of Gagan Thapa speaking at the parliament in August 2024.
Conclusion
No, Nepali Congress General Secretary Gagan Thapa didn’t bow or apologise to RSP Chair Rabi Lamichhane. The viral claim is exaggerated, and thus is misleading.
Result: False
Sources
Hamrakura.com , August 13, 2024
AP1HD, August 13, 2024
Khabarhub, Nov 14, 2024
Video Nepal /YouTube , Nov 12, 2024
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Sanjeeb Phuyal is the Nepali Editor of Newschecker based in Kathmandu, Nepal. He brings over a decade of experience writing and editing news. In his previous stint, he worked as online editor for The Kathmandu Post. With the growth of social media platforms—and the ever-growing competition amongst media outlets to churn out breaking news, he feels that fact-checking every piece of information has become more essential today than ever before.
