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
A brawl broke out between lawmakers of CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Centre) in the House of Representatives.
Fact
No, the viral video shows a CPN (Maoist Centre) lawmaker criticising the CPN-UML and Nepali Congress.
A viral video claiming that a fist-fight broke out in the House of Representatives between the lawmakers of Communist Party of Nepal-Unified Marxist Leninist (CPN-UML) and CPN (Maoist Centre) is going viral on TikTok.
The video goes viral even as the four-month long partnership between CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Centre) collapsed after the CPN-UML Chairman KP Sharma Oli sealed an agreement with the Nepali Congress President Sher Bahadur Deuba on the midnight of July 2 to form a new government.
Against this backdrop, TikTok user @manoj_kc5 posted a video showing CPN (Maoist Centre) Lawmaker Madhav Sapkota speaking in the parliament. Text superimposed on the video reads, “Lawmakers of CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Centre) engaged in a fist-fight in the parliament. Rabi Lamichhane [Incumbent Home Minister and Chairman of Rastriya Swatantra Party] issued an open challenge.”
In the video clip, Sapkota says, “How could those who are covered in the black stains of Giri Bandhu Tea Estate scam and left restless due to the arrest of Bechan Jha in fake Bhutanese refugee scam lecture us on morality?” After the evidence of Jha came out, you became restless and started seeing holes in the boat. You were the ones who used to dub Kamal Thapa [former chairman of pro-monarchist Rastriya Prajatantra Party] as being a person with mouse tendency. A mouse runs away when it sees a hole in the boat but a valiant person faces them.” He goes on to say, “Why are they keeping the mid-night deal still a secret? What are they fearing? This shows their non-transparency and immorality.”
The video posted on July 7 has garnered 496 likes, six users have shared it and 13 people commented until the last count. The archived version of the TikTok video can be seen here.
Fact Check /Verification
To check the authenticity of the claim made in the viral video, Newschecker took a keyframe from the viral video and ran a reverse search on Google. The search led us to a video, dated July 7 2024, whose frames matched the viral video clip. On checking the video published on the YouTube Channel named Onlinepana, we found that the video frame from 1.42-minute onwards exactly matched the viral video. However, we didn’t find any footage showing the lawmakers engaged in a brawl.
Further, we checked the YouTube channel of the House of Representatives of Nepal and checked the recent videos of the parliament meeting. On checking a video dated July 7, we found that the clip from 1 hr 12.42-minute onwards exactly matched the viral video. We thoroughly checked the 2 hour 22 minutes and 50 seconds video but didn’t see any brawl between the lawmakers.
We checked if there was any news of fist-fight in Nepal’s parliament, but didn’t find anything.
Lastly, we also ran a search on Google by using the relevant keywords and found a news article, dated July 7, 2024, published on My Republica online. According to the article, Maoist lawmaker Sapkota remarked that the current game of demolishing the government began with the arrest of Bechana Jha, an accused in the fake Bhutanese refugee scam.
Thus, our findings clearly indicate that the viral video shows Maoist lawmaker Sapkota speaking in the parliament, and there was no fist-fight in the parliament.
Conclusion
No, there was no fist-fight in the parliament between the lawmakers of CPN-UML and CPN (Maoist Centre). The viral video is misleading.
Result: False
Sources
Onlinepana /YouTube, July 7, 2024
House of Representatives Nepal /YouTube, July 7, 2024
My Republica, July 7, 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.
