2024 Clip of Shashi Tharoor Criticising Trump Linked To Recent US Delegation

This clip dates back to September 2024, when Tharoor spoke at an event in New York, USA

Fact-Check: This clip dates back to 2024 and is not recent, as claimed.

(Source: The Quint) 

A video of senior Congress leader Shashi Tharoor is going viral with the claim that Tharoor, while in the United States of America (USA), criticised President Donald Trump publicly.

Those sharing have claimed that this took place during the recent all-party delegation sent to the USA and other countries to highlight Pakistan's stance and its zero-tolerance approach to global terrorism, following Operation Sindoor.

What did he say?: Tharoor noted that while it's not appropriate for him to comment on political leaders of other countries while on their soil, he expressed his personal opinion that previous US presidents whom he interacted with, such as George Bush, Bill Clinton, and Barack Obama, were great statesmen and had a 'certain class.' However, he said that Trump did not have the same manner and lacked the class and intellectual quality as the former presidents.

An archive of the post can be found here. 

(Source: Facebook) 

(Archives of similar claims can be found here and here.)

Is the claim true?: No, the claim is false as this video is from the Jaipur Literature Festival (JLF) in New York. This took place in September 2024.

What we found: We divided the video into multiple screenshots and ran a Google reverse image search on some of them.

• We came across the video on the Asia Society's Instagram account dated 24 September 2024.

• The post's caption referred to a panel at JLF International that posed a question regarding Trump to Tharoor.

• We ran a relevant keyword search and found the longer version posted on 12 September 2024 on the YouTube channel of JLF International.

• The segment of the viral video can be found starting at 12:54 minutes.

• In this video, Aroon Purie, founder of India Today Group, engaged with Tharoor on different subjects. At the timestamp, Purie asked Tharoor, his thoughts on Trump.

• The portion in the viral clip can be heard hereafter.

Conclusion: An old video of Tharoor speaking at a public platform in USA, criticising President Trump has gone viral to falsely claim that it took place on the recent US delegation visit to brief countries about Operation Sindoor.

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