Man Calling for Boycott of Reliance, Patanjali Misidentified as Himalaya Founder

The person in the video is an advocate in Delhi and not the founder of Himalaya.

Fact-Check: The man in the video is a lawyer and not the founder of Himalaya.

(Source: The Quint) 

A clip showing a man urging individuals to avoid purchasing items from Reliance and Baba Ramdev's Patanjali in Delhi has gone viral, with social media users labelling him as the 'owner of Himalaya company'.

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.

• We found that the individual in the viral video is Bhanu Pratap Singh, a lawyer from Delhi, who gave this speech at a protest in support of the Citizenship Amendment Act (CAA) in January 2020.

What we found: We ran a relevant keyword search, we found the same video from 2021.

• After taking a hint from the logo displayed in the viral video, we ran a relevant keyword search using “times express voice of democracy” and discovered the YouTube channel named 'Times Express'.

• Upon checking, we found that the original video had been removed from the YouTube channel.

Here is a screengrab from YouTube. 

(Source: YouTube) 

• We then checked for the video on WayBack Machine, a website that keeps digital archives of websites and found the original video.

Here is the archive of the original video. 

(Source: WayBack Machine/Screenshot) 

• The viral clip starts at the 04:37 minute mark in the 12-minute-long video showing an anti-CAA demonstration.

• The video caption mentions that the man speaking in Mustafabad, Delhi, is identified as advocate Bhanu Pratap Singh. His social media accounts indicated that he is a lawyer based in Delhi.

Here is a link to Singh's Facebook page. 

(Source: Facebook) 

• We also found that the founder of Himalaya Drug Company, M Manal, died in 1986, as per their website.

Team WebQoof found that Manal died in 1986.

(Source: Himalaya Website) 

Similar claims were also viral in 2021 and Team WebQoof published a story about the same back then.

Conclusion: A false claim stating that Himalaya's founder called for a boycott against Reliance and Patanjali products.

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